9 ideas
9916 | Convention, yes! Arbitrary, no! [Poincaré, by Putnam] |
Full Idea: Poincaré once exclaimed, 'Convention, yes! Arbitrary, no!'. | |
From: report of Henri Poincaré (talk [1901]) by Hilary Putnam - Models and Reality | |
A reaction: An interesting view. It mustn't be assumed that conventions are not rooted in something. Maybe a sort of pragmatism is implied. |
2851 | Emotivists find it hard to analyse assertions of moral principles, rather than actual judgements [Brink] |
Full Idea: It is hard for the emotivist to give an analysis of the occurrence of moral ideas in unasserted contexts, such as "IF he did wrong, then he should be punished". | |
From: David O. Brink (Emotivism [1995], p.224) | |
A reaction: This is the 'Frege-Geach Problem'. |
2850 | How can emotivists explain someone who recognises morality but is indifferent to it? [Brink] |
Full Idea: It is not clear how the emotivist can accommodate the amoralist - one who recognises moral requirements but is indifferent to them. | |
From: David O. Brink (Emotivism [1995], p.224) | |
A reaction: Nietzsche recognised current morals, but was indifferent to them. It is hard to imagine, though, an amoralist who lacked all the feelings which imply morality. |
2848 | Two people might agree in their emotional moral attitude while disagreeing in their judgement [Brink] |
Full Idea: Critics of emotivism claim that moral agreement need not track agreement in attitude; moralists with the same attitude can disagree in their views, and they can hold the same view while disagreeing in attitude. | |
From: David O. Brink (Emotivism [1995], p.224) | |
A reaction: Thus two racists can disagree about how racists should behave. Sounds like a good criticism. |
2853 | Emotivists claim to explain moral motivation by basing morality on non-cognitive attitudes [Brink] |
Full Idea: By stressing the intimate connection between moral judgements and the agent's non-cognitive attitudes, emotivists claim to capture the motivational properties of moral judgement. | |
From: David O. Brink (Emotivism [1995], p.223) | |
A reaction: The same claim is made by contractarians, who start from our universal self-interest. Emotivists also nicely capture the motivation properties of immoral judgements. |
2852 | Emotivists tend to favour a redundancy theory of truth, making moral judgement meaningless [Brink] |
Full Idea: If you want to recognise the truth of some moral judgements, perhaps to make room for the possibility of moral mistakes, then one may not be satisfied with the emotivists' tendency to appeal to the redundancy theory of truth. | |
From: David O. Brink (Emotivism [1995], p.224) | |
A reaction: Probably thinking of Simon Blackburn. People who adopt a redundancy view of truth for semantics are left floundering when discussing what is true in the rest of philosophy. |
2849 | Emotivism implies relativism about moral meanings, but critics say disagreements are about moral reference [Brink] |
Full Idea: Emotivism suggests that different feelings lead to different individual meanings for moral terms, but critics say that meanings are the same, and disagreement is about the extension (range of reference) of the terms. | |
From: David O. Brink (Emotivism [1995], p.224) | |
A reaction: It's hard to see how 'ought to p' could have quite different meanings for an emotivist and (say) a theistic moralist. 'Ought' is an obvious and simple word. Good criticism. |
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. |