51 ideas
| 22216 | Phenomenology studies different types of correlation between consciousness and its objects [Husserl, by Bernet] |
| Full Idea: Husserl's phenomenology is the science of the intentional correlation of acts of consciousness with their objects and it studies the ways in which different kinds of objects involve different kinds of correlation with different kinds of acts. | |
| From: report of Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913]) by Rudolf Bernet - Husserl p.198 | |
| A reaction: I notice he uncritically accepts Husserl's description of it as a 'science'. My naive question is how you would distinguish one kind of 'correlation' from another. |
| 21217 | Phenomenology needs absolute reflection, without presuppositions [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: Phenomenology demands the most perfect freedom from presuppositions and, concerning itself, an absolute reflective insight. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], III.1.063), quoted by Victor Velarde-Mayol - On Husserl 3.1 | |
| A reaction: As an outsider, I would have thought that the whole weight of modern continental philosophy is entirely opposed to the aspiration to think without presuppositions. |
| 22218 | There can only be a science of fluctuating consciousness if it focuses on stable essences [Husserl, by Bernet] |
| Full Idea: How can there be a science of a Heraclitean flux of acts of consciousness? Husserl answers that this is possible only if these acts are described in respect of their invariant or essential structure. This is an 'eidetic' scence of 'pure' psychology. | |
| From: report of Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913]) by Rudolf Bernet - Husserl p.199 | |
| A reaction: This is his phenomenology in 1913, which Bernet describes as 'static'. Husserl later introduced time with his 'genetic' version of phenomenology, looking at the sources of experience (and then at history). Essentialism seems to be intuitive. |
| 22217 | Phenomenology aims to validate objects, on the basis of intentional intuitive experience [Husserl, by Bernet] |
| Full Idea: Husserl's goal is to account for the validity, the 'being-true', of objects on the basis of the way in which they are given or constituted. ...Experiences more suitable for guaranteeing objects are those which both intend and intuitively apprehend them. | |
| From: report of Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913]) by Rudolf Bernet - Husserl p.199 | |
| A reaction: [compressed] In the light of previous scepticism and idealism, the project sounds a bit optimistic. If there is a gulf between mind and world it can only be bridged by 'reaching out' from both sides. This is a mind-sided attempt. |
| 22219 | Husserl saw transcendental phenomenology as idealist, in its construction of objects [Husserl, by Bernet] |
| Full Idea: Phenomeonology is 'transcendental' in describing the correlation between phenomena and intentional objects, to show how their meaning and validity are constructed. Husserl gave this process an idealist interpretation (which Heidegger criticised). | |
| From: report of Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913]) by Rudolf Bernet - Husserl p.200 | |
| A reaction: [compressed] If the actions which produce our concepts of objects all take place 'behind' phenomenal consciousness, then it is hard to avoid sliding into some sort of idealism. It encourages direct realism about perception. |
| 22204 | Start philosophising with no preconceptions, from the intuitively non-theoretical self-given [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: Where other philosophers ...start from unclarified, ungrounded preconceptions, we start out from that which antedates all standpoints: from the totality of the intuitively self-given which is prior to any theorising reflexion. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], I.2.020) | |
| A reaction: This is the great aim of Phenomenology, which is obviously inspired by Hegel's similar desire to start from nothing. Hegel starts from a concept ('nothing'), but Husserl starts from raw experience. I suspect both approaches are idle dreams. |
| 22207 | Epoché or 'bracketing' is refraining from judgement, even when some truths are certain [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: In relation to every thesis we can use this peculiar epoché (the phenomenon of 'bracketing' or 'disconnecting'), a certain refraining from judgment which is compatible with the unshaken and unshakable because self-evidencing conviction of Truth. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.1.031) | |
| A reaction: This is the crucial first step of Phenomenology. It seems to me that it is best described as 'methodological scepticism'. People actually practise it all the time, while they focus on some experience, while trying to forget preconceptions. |
| 22208 | 'Bracketing' means no judgements at all about spatio-temporal existence [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: I use the 'phenomenological' epoché, which completely bars me from using any judgment that concerns spatio-temporal existence. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.1.032) | |
| A reaction: This makes bracketing (or epoché) into a sort of voluntary idealism. Put like that, it is hard to see what benefits it could bring. I am, you will notice, a pretty thorough sceptic about the project of phenomenology. What has it taught us? |
| 22210 | After everything is bracketed, consciousness still has a unique being of its own [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: We fix our eyes steadily upon the sphere of Consciousness and study what it is that we find immanent in it. ...Consciousness in itself has a being of its own which in its absolute uniqueness of nature remains unaffected by disconnection. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.2.033) | |
| A reaction: 'Disconnection' is his 'bracketing'. He makes it sound obvious, but Schopenhauer entirely disagrees with him, and I have no idea how to arbitrate. I struggle to grasp consciousness once nature has been bracketed, but have little luck. Is it Da-sein? |
| 22215 | Phenomenology describes consciousness, in the light of pure experiences [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: Phenomenology is a pure descriptive discipline which studies the whole field of pure transcendental consciousness in the light of pure intuition. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.4.059) | |
| A reaction: When he uses the word 'pure' three times in a sentence, each applied to a different thing, you begin to wonder precisely what it means. Strictly speaking, I would probably only apply 'pure' to abstracta, and never to experiences or reality.115 |
| 20981 | What justifies reliance on reason? Is it just a tool? Why is it better than blind belief? [Sen] |
| Full Idea: What is the ultimate justification for relying on reason? Is reason cherished as a good tool, and if so, how does it differ from blind and unquestioning belief? | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 01 'Critique') | |
| A reaction: And can it answer the romantic charge of stunting a rich life? NIetzsche started this one, by asking the value of truth. Proposal: treat others rationally, and treat yourself intuitively. |
| 20982 | In politics and ethics, scrutiny from different perspectives is essential for objectivity [Sen] |
| Full Idea: I take reasoned scrutiny from different perspectives to be an essential part of the demands of objectivity for ethical and political convictions. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 01 'Adam') | |
| A reaction: We should distinguish the nature of objectivity from ways of achieving it. Multiple perspectives don't guarantee objectivity. This is peer review in science, and publisher's readers of philosophy texts. What is objectivity? The same as truth? |
| 22201 | The use of mathematical-style definitions in philosophy is fruitless and harmful [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: Definition cannot take the same form in philosophy as it does in mathematics; the imitation of mathematical procedure is invariably in this respect not only unfruitful, but perverse and most harmful in its consequences. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], Intro) | |
| A reaction: A hundred years of analytic philosophy has entirely ignored this warning. My heart has always sunk when I read '=def...' in a philosophy article (which is usually American). The illusion of rigour. |
| 22209 | Our goal is to reveal a new hidden region of Being [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: We could refer to our goal as the winning of a new region of Being, the distinctive character of which has not yet been defined. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.2.033) | |
| A reaction: The obvious fruit of this idea, I would think, is Heidegger's concept of Da-sein, which claims to be a distinctively human region of Being. I'm not sure I can cope with the claim that Being itself (a very broad-brush term) has hidden regions. |
| 22211 | As a thing and its perception are separated, two modes of Being emerge [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: We are left with the transcendence of the thing over against the perception of it, ...and thus a basic and essential difference arises between Being as Experience and Being as Thing. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.2.042) | |
| A reaction: I'm thinking that this is not just the germ of Heidegger's concept of Da-sein, but it actually IS his concept, without the label. Husserl had said that he hoped to reveal a new region of Being. |
| 22202 | The World is all experiencable objects [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: The World is the totality of objects that can be known through experience. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], I.1.001) | |
| A reaction: I think this is the 'Nature' which has to be 'bracketed', when pursuing Phenomenology. It sounds like anti-realist empiricism, which has no place for unobservables. |
| 22213 | Absolute reality is an absurdity [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: An absolute reality is just as valid as a round square. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.3.055) | |
| A reaction: Husserl distances himself from 'Berkeleyian' idealism, but his discussion keeps flirting with, perhaps in some sort of have-your-cake-and-eat-it Hegelian way. Perhaps it is close to Dummett's Anti-Realism. |
| 21218 | The sense of anything contingent has a purely apprehensible essence or Eidos [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: It belongs to the sense of anything contingent to have an essence and therefore an Eidos which can be apprehended purely. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], I.1.002), quoted by Victor Velarde-Mayol - On Husserl 3.2.2 | |
| A reaction: This is the quirky idea that we can know necessary categorial essences a priori, even if the category is currently empty. Crops us in Lowe. Husserl says grasping the corresponding individuals must be possible. Third Man question. |
| 19263 | Imagine an object's properties varying; the ones that won't vary are the essential ones [Husserl, by Vaidya] |
| Full Idea: Husserl's 'eidetic variation' implies that we can judge the essential properties of an object by varying the properties of the object in imagination, and seeing which vary and which do not. | |
| From: report of Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913]) by Anand Vaidya - Understanding and Essence 'Knowledge' | |
| A reaction: The problem with this is that there are trivial or highly general necessary properties which are obviously not essential to the thing. Vaidya says [822] you can't perform the experiment without prior knowledge of the essence. |
| 21220 | The physical given, unlike the mental given, could be non-existing [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: Anything physical which is given in person can be non-existing, no mental process which is given in person can be non-existing. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.2.046), quoted by Victor Velarde-Mayol - On Husserl 3.3.5 | |
| A reaction: This endorsement of Descartes shows how strong the influence of the Cogito remained in later continental philosophy. Phenomenology is a footnote to Descartes. |
| 22205 | Feelings of self-evidence (and necessity) are just the inventions of theory [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: So-called feelings of self-evidence, of intellectual necessity, and however they may otherwise be called, are just theoretically invented feelings. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], I.2.021) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be a dismissal of the a priori necessary on the grounds that it is 'theory-laden' - which is why it has to be bracketed in order to do phenomenology. |
| 21221 | Direct 'seeing' by consciousness is the ultimate rational legitimation [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: Immediate 'seeing', not merely sensuous, experiential seeing, but seeing in the universal sense as an originally presenting consciousness of any kind whatsoever, is the ultimate legitimising source of all rational assertions. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], I.2.019), quoted by Victor Velarde-Mayol - On Husserl 3.3.5 | |
| A reaction: Husserl is (I gather from this) a classic rationalist. Just like Descartes' judgement of the molten wax. |
| 22220 | The phenomena of memory are given in the present, but as being past [Husserl, by Bernet] |
| Full Idea: In Husserl's phenomenology, the intentional object of a memory is the object of a past experience, which is intuitively given to me in the present, not, however, as being present but as being past. | |
| From: report of Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913]) by Rudolf Bernet - Husserl p.203 | |
| A reaction: I certainly don't have to assess my mental events, and judge which are past, which are now, and which are future imaginings. I suppose Fodor would say they are memories because we find them in the memory-box. How else could it work? |
| 22206 | Natural science has become great by just ignoring ancient scepticism [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: Natural science has grown to greatness by pushing ruthlessly aside the rank growth of ancient skepticism and renouncing the attempt to conquer it. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], I.2.026) | |
| A reaction: This may be because scepticism is boring, or it may be because science 'brackets' scepticism, leaving philosophers to worry about it. |
| 22221 | We know another's mind via bodily expression, while also knowing it is inaccessible [Husserl, by Bernet] |
| Full Idea: Another person's consciousness is given to me through the expressive stratum of her body, which gives me access to her experience while making me realise that it is inaccessible to me. Empathy is a presentation of what is absent. | |
| From: report of Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913]) by Rudolf Bernet - Husserl p.203 | |
| A reaction: This is the phenomenological approach to the problem of other minds, by examining the raw experience of encountering another person. It is true that we seem to both know and not know another person's mind when we encounter them. |
| 22212 | Pure consciousness is a sealed off system of actual Being [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: Consciousness, considered in its 'purity', must be reckoned as a self-contained system of Being, a system of actual Being, into which nothing can penetrate, and from which nothing can escape. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.3.049) | |
| A reaction: Recorded without comment, to show that among phenomenologists there is a way of thinking about consciousness which is a long way from analytic discussions of the topic. |
| 22214 | We never meet the Ego, as part of experience, or as left over from experience [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: We never stumble across the pure Ego as an experience within the flux of manifold experiences which survives as transcendental residuum; nor do we meet it as a constitutive bit of experience appearing with the experience of which it is an integral part. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], II.4.057) | |
| A reaction: It seems that he agrees with David Hume. Sartre's 'Transcendence of the Ego' follows up this idea. However, Husserl goes on to assert the 'necessity' of the permanent Ego, which sounds like Kant's view. |
| 20990 | Rationality is conformity to reasons that can be sustained even after scrutiny [Sen] |
| Full Idea: My main argument can be fairly easily understood in terms of seeing rationality as conformity with reasons that one can sustain, even after scrutiny, and not just at first sight. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 08 'Rational' n) | |
| A reaction: We would need to say more about the 'scrutiny' before we had a really good account of rationality here. In Idea 20982 he emphasises the need for scrutiny by other people, and not mere self-criticism. The key may to be invite outside criticism. |
| 22203 | Only facts follow from facts [Husserl] |
| Full Idea: From facts follow always nothing but facts. | |
| From: Edmund Husserl (Ideas: intro to pure phenomenology [1913], I.1.008) | |
| A reaction: I presume objective possibilities follow from facts, so this doesn't sound strictly correct. I sounds like a nice slogan for those desiring to keep facts separate from values. [on p.53 he comments on fact/value] |
| 21005 | A human right is not plausible if public scrutiny might reject it [Sen] |
| Full Idea: The force of a claim for a human right would indeed be seriously undermined if it were possible to show that it is unlikely to survive open public scrutiny. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 17 'Scrutiny') | |
| A reaction: This is a public aspect of Scanlon's 'contractualist' approach to ethics. You can hardly disagree with the idea, though anti-racist legislation in a strongly racist society might be a good test case. |
| 20983 | The original position insures that the agreements reached are fair [Sen] |
| Full Idea: The original position is the appropriate initial status quo which insures that the fundamental agreements reached in it are fair. This fact yields the name 'justice as fairness'. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 01.4) | |
| A reaction: I suppose it insures fairness on day one of the new society, but that might have all been wiped out in the next fortnight, when you find you are the least advantaged as a result of racism. |
| 20987 | The veil of ignorance encourages neutral interests, but not a wider view of values [Sen] |
| Full Idea: The veil of ignorance is very effective for making people see beyond their vested interests and goals. And yet it does little to ensure an open scrutiny of local and possibly parochial values. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 06 'Original') | |
| A reaction: Communitarians also make a similar criticism of Rawls - that people in the initial position simplify themselves into pure rational agents looking for 'basic goods'. |
| 20984 | A social contract limits the pursuit of justice to members of a single society [Sen] |
| Full Idea: The use of the social contract in the Rawlsian form inescapably limits the involvement of participants in the pursuit of justice to the members of a given polity, or 'people'. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 02 'Relevance') | |
| A reaction: This relates to the criticism of contractarian ethics - that the weak have nothing to bargain with. One can either add international contracts, or appeal to natural human rights. Or we could just be nice to one another? Nah! |
| 20986 | A person's voice may count because of their interests, or because of their good sense [Sen] |
| Full Idea: A person's voice may count either because her interests are involved, or because he reasoning and judgement can enlighten a discussion. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 04 'Diversity') | |
| A reaction: Good. Inarticulate people may have strong interests, and articulate and helpful people may be wholly disinterested. But people may have unworthy interests, and may be articulate but not sensible. |
| 21001 | Famines tend to be caused by authoritarian rule [Sen] |
| Full Idea: The history of famines has had a peculiarly close connection with authoritarian rules. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 16 'Famine') | |
| A reaction: He cites the British Empire, the Soviet Union, China and Cambodia. There is unlikely to be a local famine if there is free movement of food supplies.342 |
| 21002 | Effective democracy needs tolerant values [Sen] |
| Full Idea: The formation of tolerant values is quite central to the smooth functioning of a democratic system. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 16 'Minority') | |
| A reaction: There is presumably a brutal sort of democracy, if the majority in a polarised society agree to crush a minority. |
| 20999 | Democracy as 'government by discussion' now has wide support [Sen] |
| Full Idea: In contemporary political philosophy the view that democracy is best seen as 'government by discussion' has gained widespread support. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 15 'Content') | |
| A reaction: The obvious worry about this is inefficiency in decision-making. Also the dominance of noisy stupidity. But citizens need to feel involved, and committed to the decisions. |
| 20979 | Democracy needs more than some institutions; diverse sections of the people must be heard [Sen] |
| Full Idea: Democracy has to be judged not just by the institutions that formally exist but by the extent to which different voices from diverse sections of the people can actually be heard. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], Pref 'Public') | |
| A reaction: Depends what you mean by 'democracy'. Should the workplace and the school and the family be democratic, or just the choice of leaders? What can oblige leaders to listen to the people? Listen to, and then ignore? |
| 20993 | Eradicating smallpox does not impoverish nature [Sen] |
| Full Idea: The eradication of smallpox is not viewed as an impoverishment of nature. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 11 'Sustainable') | |
| A reaction: You'd have to be a pretty 'deep' ecologist to defend the carrier of smallpox, or Dutch Elm disease. The idea is included for balance. |
| 20995 | Capabilities are part of freedom, involving real opportunities [Sen] |
| Full Idea: Capability is an aspect of freedom, concentrating in particular on substantive opportunities. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 13 'Well-being') | |
| A reaction: This is the 'capabilities approach' of Sen and Nussbaum. The key word is 'substantive' (as opposed to theoretical). We are all free to become astronauts, but.... |
| 20998 | Freedom can involve capabilities, independence and non-interference [Sen] |
| Full Idea: There is no embarrassment in accommodating several distinct features within the idea of freedom, focusing respectively on capability, lack of dependence and lack of interference. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 14 'Capability') | |
| A reaction: This relates to Berlin's distinction between negative and positive rights. |
| 20997 | The need for equality among people arises from impartiality and objectivity [Sen] |
| Full Idea: The demand for seeing people as equals (in some important perspective) relates to the normative demand for impartiality, and the related claims of objectivity. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 14 'Equality') | |
| A reaction: Either impartiality already contains (analytically) the concept of equality, or the principle of sufficient reason must be invoked. True impartiality removes any reason for preferring one person to another. But what if preference is 'to my taste'? |
| 20996 | All modern theories of justice demand equality of something [Sen] |
| Full Idea: Every normative theory of social justice that has received support and advocacy in recent times seems to demand equality of something. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 14 Intro) | |
| A reaction: He mentions liberties, income, rights and utilities. |
| 20988 | Freedom from torture or terrorist attacks is independent of citizenship [Sen] |
| Full Idea: The human right of a person not to be tortured or subjected to terrorist attacks is affirmed independently of the country of which this person is a citizen. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 06 'Exclusionary') | |
| A reaction: If rights can only be enshrined in a legal system, then I presume all systems of legal rights should ensure rights like these, irrespective of their nation. A universal charter of rights for tourists and alien residents? |
| 20980 | You don't need a complete theory of justice to see that slavery is wrong [Sen] |
| Full Idea: It was the diagnosis of an intolerable injustice in slavery that made abolition an overwhelming priority, and this did not require a search for a consensus on what a perfectly just society would look like. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], Intro 'Classical') | |
| A reaction: This illustrates Sen's key points, that we should focus on injustices, which are obvious, and that designing a totally just society has little relevance to justice in practice (which is what matters). Well said. |
| 20978 | Practical justice concerns not only ideals, but ways to achieve them [Sen] |
| Full Idea: A theory of justice that can serve as the basis of practical reason must include ways of judging how to reduce injustice and advance justice, rather than aiming only at the characterisation of perfectly just societies. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], Pref 'What') | |
| A reaction: Sounds simple, but this is Amartya Sen's revolutionary new idea - that justice is not just ideals and opportunities, but what sort of life people actually end up with. |
| 20985 | Our institutions should promote justice, rather than embodying it [Sen] |
| Full Idea: We have to seek institutions that promote justice, rather than treating the institutions as themselves manifestations of justice. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 03 'Institutions') | |
| A reaction: The best quote I can find for summarising Sen's view. He criticises Rawls and others for trying to design institutions that embody justice. Our legal system promotes justice. Do our schools and hospitals? The Department for the Promotion of Justice? |
| 20994 | We must focus on removing manifest injustice, not just try to design a perfect society [Sen] |
| Full Idea: The demands of justice must give priority to the removal of manifest injustice, rather than concentrating on the long-distance search for the perfectly just society. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 12 'Disability') | |
| A reaction: So the point is not to understand the world, but to change it? I'd want to put in a word for the theoretical and idealised project, which I see in terms of writing the perfect constitution. You can't just pick off injustices, perceived intuitively. |
| 21000 | If justice needs public reasoning, which needs democracy, then justice and democracy are linked [Sen] |
| Full Idea: If the demands of justice can be assessed only with the help of public reasoning, and that is constitutively related to the idea of democracy, then there is an intimate connection between justice and democracy. | |
| From: Amartya Sen (The Idea of Justice [2009], 15 'Content') | |
| A reaction: I suspect that he argued early on that rationality required many perspectives in order to later mount this defence of democracy. |
| 1748 | Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless [Archelaus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless. | |
| From: report of Archelaus (fragments/reports [c.450 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.Ar.3 |
| 5989 | Archelaus said life began in a primeval slime [Archelaus, by Schofield] |
| Full Idea: Archelaus wrote that life on Earth began in a primeval slime. | |
| From: report of Archelaus (fragments/reports [c.450 BCE]) by Malcolm Schofield - Archelaus | |
| A reaction: This sounds like a fairly clearcut assertion of the production of life by evolution. Darwin's contribution was to propose the mechanism for achieving it. We should honour the name of Archelaus for this idea. |