4 ideas
18902 | Correspondence theories can't tell you what truths correspond to [Davidson] |
Full Idea: The real objection to correspondence theories is that such theories fail to provide entities to which truth vehicles (as statements, sentence, or utterances) can be said to correspond. | |
From: Donald Davidson (The Structure and Content of Truth [1990], p.304), quoted by Fred Sommers - Intellectual Autobiography Notes 23 | |
A reaction: This is the remark which provoked Sommers to come out with Idea 18901, which strikes me as rather profound. |
22456 | Maybe virtues conflict with each other, if some virtue needs a vice for its achievement [Foot] |
Full Idea: Maybe so far from forming a unity ...., the virtues actually conflict with each other: that is, if someone has one of them he inevitably fails to have some other. ...Maybe he a man can only be good in one way be being bad in another. | |
From: Philippa Foot (Moral Realism and Moral Dilemma [1983], p.57) | |
A reaction: She suggests the self-loathing needed to rein in evil desires. She cites Nietzsche having a similar thought. Presumably the ideal virtuous person has no such conflicts, and the self-loathing undermines eudaimonia. Unity in theory but not in practice? |
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. |