81 ideas
| 19693 | There is practical wisdom (for action), and theoretical wisdom (for deep understanding) [Aristotle, by Whitcomb] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle takes wisdom to come in two forms, the practical and the theoretical, the former of which is good judgement about how to act, and the latter of which is deep knowledge or understanding. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Dennis Whitcomb - Wisdom Intro | |
| A reaction: The interesting question is then whether the two are connected. One might be thoroughly 'sensible' about action, without counting as 'wise', which seems to require a broader view of what is being done. Whitcomb endorses Aristotle on this idea. |
| 1575 | For Aristotle logos is essentially the ability to talk rationally about questions of value [Roochnik on Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: For Aristotle logos is the ability to speak rationally about, with the hope of attaining knowledge, questions of value. | |
| From: comment on Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by David Roochnik - The Tragedy of Reason p.26 |
| 1589 | Aristotle is the supreme optimist about the ability of logos to explain nature [Roochnik on Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle is the great theoretician who articulates a vision of a world in which natural and stable structures can be rationally discovered. His is the most optimistic and richest view of the possibilities of logos | |
| From: comment on Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by David Roochnik - The Tragedy of Reason p.95 |
| 8200 | Aristotelian definitions aim to give the essential properties of the thing defined [Aristotle, by Quine] |
| Full Idea: A real definition, according to the Aristotelian tradition, gives the essence of the kind of thing defined. Man is defined as a rational animal, and thus rationality and animality are of the essence of each of us. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Willard Quine - Vagaries of Definition p.51 | |
| A reaction: Compare Idea 4385. Personally I prefer the Aristotelian approach, but we may have to say 'We cannot identify the essence of x, and so x cannot be defined'. Compare 'his mood was hard to define' with 'his mood was hostile'. |
| 4385 | Aristotelian definition involves first stating the genus, then the differentia of the thing [Aristotle, by Urmson] |
| Full Idea: For Aristotle, to give a definition one must first state the genus and then the differentia of the kind of thing to be defined. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by J.O. Urmson - Aristotle's Doctrine of the Mean p.157 | |
| A reaction: Presumably a modern definition would just be a list of properties, but Aristotle seeks the substance. How does he define a genus? - by placing it in a further genus? |
| 13282 | Aristotle relativises the notion of wholeness to different measures [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle proposes to relativise unity and plurality, so that a single object can be both one (indivisible) and many (divisible) simultaneously, without contradiction, relative to different measures. Wholeness has degrees, with the strength of the unity. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 7.2.12 | |
| A reaction: [see Koslicki's account of Aristotle for details] As always, the Aristotelian approach looks by far the most promising. Simplistic mechanical accounts of how parts make wholes aren't going to work. We must include the conventional and conceptual bit. |
| 4730 | For Aristotle, the subject-predicate structure of Greek reflected a substance-accident structure of reality [Aristotle, by O'Grady] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle apparently believed that the subject-predicate structure of Greek reflected the substance-accident nature of reality. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Paul O'Grady - Relativism Ch.4 | |
| A reaction: We need not assume that Aristotle is wrong. It is a chicken-and-egg. There is something obvious about subject-predicate language, if one assumes that unified objects are part of nature, and not just conventional. |
| 13276 | The unmoved mover and the soul show Aristotelian form as the ultimate mereological atom [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle's discussion of the unmoved mover and of the soul confirms the suspicion that form, when it is not thought of as the object represented in a definition, plays the role of the ultimate mereological atom within his system. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 6.6 | |
| A reaction: Aristotle is concerned with which things are 'divisible', and he cites these two examples as indivisible, but they may be too unusual to offer an actual theory of how Aristotle builds up wholes from atoms. He denies atoms in matter. |
| 13277 | The 'form' is the recipe for building wholes of a particular kind [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
| Full Idea: Thus in Aristotle we may think of an object's formal components as a sort of recipe for how to build wholes of that particular kind. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 7.2.5 | |
| A reaction: In the elusive business of pinning down what Aristotle means by the crucial idea of 'form', this analogy strikes me as being quite illuminating. It would fit DNA in living things, and the design of an artifact. |
| 5991 | For Aristotle, knowledge is of causes, and is theoretical, practical or productive [Aristotle, by Code] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle thinks that in general we have knowledge or understanding when we grasp causes, and he distinguishes three fundamental types of knowledge - theoretical, practical and productive. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Alan D. Code - Aristotle | |
| A reaction: Productive knowledge we tend to label as 'knowing how'. The centrality of causes for knowledge would get Aristotle nowadays labelled as a 'naturalist'. It is hard to disagree with his three types, though they may overlap. |
| 11239 | The notion of a priori truth is absent in Aristotle [Aristotle, by Politis] |
| Full Idea: The notion of a priori truth is conspicuously absent in Aristotle. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Vassilis Politis - Aristotle and the Metaphysics 1.5 | |
| A reaction: Cf. Idea 11240. |
| 23312 | Aristotle is a rationalist, but reason is slowly acquired through perception and experience [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle is a rationalist …but reason for him is a disposition which we only acquire over time. Its acquisition is made possible primarily by perception and experience. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Michael Frede - Aristotle's Rationalism p.173 | |
| A reaction: I would describe this process as the gradual acquisition of the skill of objectivity, which needs the right knowledge and concepts to evaluate new experiences. |
| 16111 | Aristotle wants to fit common intuitions, and therefore uses language as a guide [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
| Full Idea: Since Aristotle generally prefers a metaphysical theory that accords with common intuitions, he frequently relies on facts about language to guide his metaphysical claims. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Mary Louise Gill - Aristotle on Substance Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: I approve of his procedure. I take intuition to be largely rational justifications too complex for us to enunciate fully, and language embodies folk intuitions in its concepts (especially if the concepts occur in many languages). |
| 23101 | Intuitions don't prove things; they just receptivity to interpretations [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Appeal to intuitions cannot prove or disprove anything. They merely create receptivity to particular interpretations of particular cases. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 04.3) | |
| A reaction: A nice point, but more is needed. A gun to the head can create receptivity. What distinguishes good from bad intuitions? Why are intuitions different from mere whims or hopes? |
| 16971 | Plato says sciences are unified around Forms; Aristotle says they're unified around substance [Aristotle, by Moravcsik] |
| Full Idea: Plato's unity of science principle states that all - legitimate - sciences are ultimately about the Forms. Aristotle's principle states that all sciences must be, ultimately, about substances, or aspects of substances. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE], 1) by Julius Moravcsik - Aristotle on Adequate Explanations 1 |
| 11243 | Aristotelian explanations are facts, while modern explanations depend on human conceptions [Aristotle, by Politis] |
| Full Idea: For Aristotle things which explain (the explanantia) are facts, which should not be associated with the modern view that says explanations are dependent on how we conceive and describe the world (where causes are independent of us). | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Vassilis Politis - Aristotle and the Metaphysics 2.1 | |
| A reaction: There must be some room in modern thought for the Aristotelian view, if some sort of robust scientific realism is being maintained against the highly linguistic view of philosophy found in the twentieth century. |
| 3320 | Aristotle's standard analysis of species and genus involves specifying things in terms of something more general [Aristotle, by Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: The standard Aristotelian doctrine of species and genus in the theory of anything whatever involves specifying what the thing is in terms of something more general. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by José A. Benardete - Metaphysics: the logical approach Ch.10 |
| 12000 | Aristotle regularly says that essential properties explain other significant properties [Aristotle, by Kung] |
| Full Idea: The view that essential properties are those in virtue of which other significant properties of the subjects under investigation can be explained is encountered repeatedly in Aristotle's work. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Joan Kung - Aristotle on Essence and Explanation IV | |
| A reaction: What does 'significant' mean here? I take it that the significant properties are the ones which explain the role, function and powers of the object. |
| 8143 | Self is the rider, intellect the charioteer, mind the reins, and body the chariot [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: Know that the Self (Atman) is the rider, and the body the chariot; that the intellect is the charioteer, and the mind the reins. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Katha') | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as exactly right. Even my intellectual powers are servants of the self. This suggests the view of the mind as a tool, which does not seem to occur in modern discussions. |
| 8147 | We have an apparent and a true self; only the second one exists, and we must seek to know it [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: There are two selves, the apparent self, and the real Self. Of these it is the real Self (Atman), and he alone, who must be felt as truly existing. To the man who has felt him as truly existing he reveals his innermost nature. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Katha') | |
| A reaction: A central Hindu doctrine against which Buddhism rebelled, by denying the self altogether. I prefer the Hindu view. A desire to abandon the self just seems to be a desire for death. Knowledge of our essential self is more interesting. But see Idea 2932! |
| 23300 | Aristotle and the Stoics denied rationality to animals, while Platonists affirmed it [Aristotle, by Sorabji] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle, and also the Stoics, denied rationality to animals. …The Platonists, the Pythagoreans, and some more independent Aristotelians, did grant reason and intellect to animals. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Richard Sorabji - Rationality 'Denial' | |
| A reaction: This is not the same as affirming or denying their consciousness. The debate depends on how rationality is conceived. |
| 8155 | Without speech we cannot know right/wrong, true/false, good/bad, or pleasant/unpleasant [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: If there were no speech, neither right nor wrong would be known, neither the true nor the false, neither the good nor the bad, neither the pleasant nor the unpleasant. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Chandogya') | |
| A reaction: This could stand as the epigraph for the whole of modern philosophy of language. However, the text goes on to say that mind is higher than speech. The test question is the mental capabilities of animals. Do they 'know' pleasure, or truth? |
| 11240 | The notion of analytic truth is absent in Aristotle [Aristotle, by Politis] |
| Full Idea: The notion of analytic truth is conspicuously absent in Aristotle. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Vassilis Politis - Aristotle and the Metaphysics 1.5 | |
| A reaction: Cf. Idea 11239. |
| 23086 | Liberals say we are only responsible for fully autonomous actions [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: The liberal view is that people can be held responsible only for actions that are in their control: actions that reflect the agents' unforced choices, evaluations, and understanding of their significance - that is, autonomous actions. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 01.5) | |
| A reaction: Kekes, who is a somewhat right wing anti-liberal, thinks people should be mainly held responsible for the consequences, unless they have a very good excuse. |
| 23100 | Collective responsibility conflicts with responsibility's requirement of authonomy [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: The ascription of collective responsibility is inconsistent with …the belief that people should be held responsible for only their own autonomous actions. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 04) | |
| A reaction: The autonomy would need to be displaced, from the decision to act to the decision of identify with the organisation. But if you invest in an evil group you are responsible for actions you never even knew occurred (never mind autonomy). |
| 23096 | Morality should aim to prevent all evil actions, not just autonomous ones [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: If one main task of morality is to prevent evil, then morality must be concerned with all evil-producing actions, not just autonomous ones. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 03.3) | |
| A reaction: Hm. Is placing a railing next to a flight of steps a moral action? Possibly. |
| 23098 | Effects show the existence of moral responsibility, and mental states show the degree [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Psychological states are relevant to the degree of an agent's moral responsibility, while the effects of their actions are relevant to whether the agents are liable to moral responsibility. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 03.5) | |
| A reaction: He has previously offered a problem case for this, where someone's social role makes them fully responsible whatever their mental state. I still think his distinction is helpful. 1) Whose fault is it, then 2) How far are they to blame? Normal practice. |
| 23087 | Much human evil is not autonomous, so moral responsibility need not be autonomous [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: If much evil is due to nonautonomous actions, then liberals cannot be right in idenitfying the domain of moral responsibility with the domain of autonomy. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 02.1) | |
| A reaction: One might evade this anti-liberal thought by making responsibility directly proportional to degree of autonomy. Then the only counterexample would be genuine immorality that is entirely non-autonomous, but is there such a thing? |
| 23089 | Evil people may not be autonomously aware, if they misjudge the situation [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Agents who perform evil nonautonomously do not know what they are doing, because they have made a mistake in understanding or evaluating their own conduct. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 02.4) | |
| A reaction: So while liberals say that true evil must be autonomous, Kekes says it may result from factual or evaluative error, for which people are also responsible. |
| 23093 | Moral and causal responsibility are not clearly distinct [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Moral and causal responsibility cannot be distinguished as clearly as the liberal strategy requires. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 03.2) | |
| A reaction: I take assessment to be a two-stage operation. It is usually easy to assign causal responsibility. Moral responsibiity is quite different. Our negligence can make us morally responsible for an event we didn’t cause. |
| 23094 | Ought implies can means moral responsibility needs autonomy [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Ought implies can translates into the claim that only autonomous agents are morally responsible. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 03.3) | |
| A reaction: Since Kekes identifies autonomy as the key to liberalism, he sees this also as a basic liberal claim (which he rejects). I ought to ring my mother, but my phone is broken (so I ought not to ring my mother?).. |
| 23095 | Why should moral responsibility depend on autonomy, rather than social role or experience? [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Why should moral responsibility be made to depend on autonomy, rather than on intelligence, education, social role, experience, or whatever? | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 03.3) | |
| A reaction: Social role seems a particularly good one to cite. 'I didn't really understand what I was doing.' 'But it's your job to understand!' |
| 6559 | Aristotle never actually says that man is a rational animal [Aristotle, by Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: To the best of my knowledge (and somewhat to my surprise), Aristotle never actually says that man is a rational animal; however, he all but says it. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Robert Fogelin - Walking the Tightrope of Reason Ch.1 | |
| A reaction: When I read this I thought that this database would prove Fogelin wrong, but it actually supports him, as I can't find it in Aristotle either. Descartes refers to it in Med.Two. In Idea 5133 Aristotle does say that man is a 'social being'. But 22586! |
| 23090 | Liberals assume people are naturally free, equal, rational, and morally good [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: The view of human nature at the core of the liberal faith is that human beings are by their nature free, equal, rational, and morally good. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 02.5) | |
| A reaction: These four claims are quite distinct, and should be evaluated separately. I think I'm something of a liberal, but I don't really accept any of them. Hm. I just want all people to have these attributes. |
| 23117 | Love should be partial, and discriminate in favour of its object [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Love is personal and partial. It is not love if it does not discriminate in favor of its object. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 09.4) | |
| A reaction: I agree with that, mainly on the grounds that this is the natural form of human love. Generalised love of mankind seems like a distortion, even if it is well-meaning. |
| 23119 | Sentimental love distorts its object [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Love is sentimental if it exaggerates the virtues and minimises the vices of its object. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 09.5) | |
| A reaction: Not sure about this. It implies that we should retain a streak of cold evaluative objectivity, even about the people we love most. There is difference between knowing a person's qualities, and the importance we attach to those qualities. Forgive vices! |
| 23088 | Evil is not deviation from the good, any more than good is a deviation from evil [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: There is no more reason to think of evil as deviation from the good than there is to think of the good as deviation from evil. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 02.2) | |
| A reaction: This is a political moderate right winger defending the concept of evil as a basic and inescapable component of existence, in contrast to liberals who tend to deny 'pure evil'. |
| 23097 | What matters for morality is the effects of action, not the psychological causes [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: What is crucial to morality are the good and evil effects of human actions, not their psychological causes. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 03.4) | |
| A reaction: The context is his attack on the liberal idea that morality only concerns the actions of autonomous agents. Kekes says he is not a full consequentialist. He just urges that consequences be given greater weight. Even Kant must care about that. |
| 8142 | The wise prefer good to pleasure; the foolish are drawn to pleasure by desire [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: The wise prefer the good to the pleasant; the foolish, driven by fleshly desires, prefer the pleasant ot the good. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Katha') | |
| A reaction: If you consider appropriate diet, this is too obvious to be worth saying. The complication is that it is doubtful whether a life without pleasure is wholly good, and even the pleasure of food is not bad. Of two good foods, prefer the pleasant one. |
| 23099 | It is said that if an agent is not autonomous then their evil actions don't reflect on their character [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Liberals deny the reflexivity of evil, …to prevent the evil consequences of an agent's morally deplorable actions from redounding to their detriment. Evil actions are allowed to reflect on their agents only if the agents cause them autonomously. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 03.5) | |
| A reaction: A central question of morality is essentialising character. That is, when does an eater of carrots become a carrot-eater? When does a performer of wicked deeds become a wicked person? Never, say many liberals. Wrong, says Kekes. |
| 23118 | Awareness of others' suffering doesn't create an obligation to help [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: It is a mistaken assumption that knowledge of the sufferings of others creates an obligation to help them. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 09.4) | |
| A reaction: A nice question is when that knowledge does become an obligation. The obvious criteria are proximity to the suffering, and capacity to relieve it. But then a wealthy person couldn't walk down the street without such obigations. Hm. |
| 23109 | The veil of ignorance is only needed because people have bad motivations [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: If the darker aspects of human motivation did not exist, there would be no need for Rawls to place his people behind the veil of ignorance. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 07.2) | |
| A reaction: All the critics observe that Rawls's blind choosers are nothing like as simple as the mere specks of rationality he seems to imagine. The usual objection is that they are already liberals, but this objection says they are already benevolent. |
| 23114 | The chief function of the state is to arbitrate between contending visions of the good life [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: The chief function of the state is seen to be to maintain what is referred to as the dialogue or conversation among the contending visions of how life should be lived. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 08.4) | |
| A reaction: This is Kekes's defence of 'pluralism'. It is not liberal, because liberal freedom, autonomy and equality is only one of the competing visions of the good life. Almost every state suppresses some such visions. |
| 23116 | Citizenship is easier than parenthood [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: It is much easier to be a good citizen than it is to be a good parent. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 09.4) | |
| A reaction: A nice observation. It is shocking how many people are bad citizens, given the limited demands. I think philosophers have some responsibility for beliefs and values which people bring to their citizenship. Parents need communal support. |
| 23103 | Power is meant to be confined to representatives, and subsequent delegation [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Universal adult suffrage and representative government are intended to give everyone equal initial political power, and assure that delegation is the only legitimate means to acquiring greater power. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 05.1) | |
| A reaction: The delegation bit is where it all goes wrong. Once you've packed your representative off to the capital, you lose nearly all control over what sort of delegation happens next. It is hard to trust representatives voters have barely met. |
| 23107 | Prosperity is a higher social virtue than justice [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: If social institutions were to have a first virtue, …prosperity would be a much stronger candidate that justice. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 06.3) | |
| A reaction: Kekes occasionally pays lip service to ecological issues, but this shows he is not serious. Endless economic growth will kill our planet, so it should never be our prime virtue. Also the impplication that you can't be too prosperous is plainly false. |
| 23081 | Liberal basics are pluralism, freedom, rights, equality, and distributive justice - for autonomy [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: The basic liberal values are pluralism, freedom, rights, equality, and distributive justice. What makes them basically valuable is that they enable individuals to live autonomously. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 01.2) | |
| A reaction: Helpful. Kekes identifies respect for autonomy as the single value which unites all liberal doctrines (and he traces it back to Kant). |
| 23085 | The key liberal values are explained by the one core value, which is autonomy [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Liberals regard pluralism, freedom, rights, equality and distributive justice as basic …but this particular group of values is explained by the true core of liberalism, the inner citadel for whose protection all the liberal battles are waged: autonomy. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 01.5) | |
| A reaction: Given that children, soldiers, monks and nuns, and people in old folks homes have very limited autonomy, it is reasonable to query whether it really is so important. I like autonomy if I have external power over my life; not so good when in hospital. |
| 23092 | Agents have little control over the capacities needed for liberal autonomy [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: It is important [for liberals] to realise that agents have no control over their possession of the capacities and opportunities on which their autonomy depends. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 03.2) | |
| A reaction: It can be replied to Kekes that they also have little control over the capacities upon which his prized 'desert' depends. It may be an axiom of all modern political thought that people have less control than we imagine. |
| 23102 | Liberals are egalitarians, but in varying degrees [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: All liberals are egalitarians, though they may be more or less so. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 05.1) | |
| A reaction: In the broadest view, this may be the one thing which distinguishes generalised liberals from the rest. To reject it needs a basis for the rejection, and every basis for its flat rejection is anathema to liberals. |
| 23084 | Are egalitarians too coercive, or not egalitarian enough, or lax over morality? [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Egalitarian liberalism is criticised by classical [freedom] liberals for its coercive redistribution, by socialist liberals for not being egalitarian enough, and by conservative liberals for abandoning moral standards in the guise of neutrality. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 01.4) | |
| A reaction: Income tax is 'coercive' distribution, but it is done with general consent in most liberal democracies. An interesting line between the needs of the state and the needs of its most needy citizens. |
| 23082 | Liberal distribution cares more about recipients than donors [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Liberal distribution cares more about the rights of the recipients than the rights of the donors. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 01.2) | |
| A reaction: Even if you are very left wing indeed, this is an important point. A society dominated by a powerful Robin Hood (steal from the rich, for the poor) is quite likely to end in civil war. But should society allow huge individual wealths to accumulate? |
| 23079 | Liberal justice ignores desert, which is the essence of justice [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: The liberal conception of justice …excludes the essence of justice: desert. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], Pref) | |
| A reaction: Certainly our normal concept of justice includes such thoughts as 'serves him right'. The trouble with the Kekes view is his society is continually morally judging people, and most people's grounds for that are fairly irrational. It's why we have courts. |
| 23091 | Why do liberals not see a much wider range of values as basic? [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Why are prosperity, order, civility, peace, a healthy environment, security, happiness, and law-abidingness not as important as those thought of by liberals as basic? | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 02.5) | |
| A reaction: This presumes that liberals only see a narrow core of values as basic to the structure of the society. Presumably every society should be well disposed towards the nice features listed here. Would their absence wreck the society? |
| 23112 | Liberals ignore contingency, and think people are good and equal, and institutions cause evil [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Liberals comfortably believe that autonomy minimises contingency, that humans are disposed to the good, that wickedness is due to remediable institutions, and that humans are morally equal because of their autonomy. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 07.4) | |
| A reaction: In a nutshell, Kekes thinks liberals are naïve. That institutions cause evil sounds more Marxist than liberal. When individuals become evil, it is reasonable for us to think that this need not have been the case. |
| 23106 | To rectify the undeserved equality, we should give men longer and women shorter lives [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Redistribution ought to aim to equalise the life expectancy of men and women, by making men have longer and women shorter lives. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 05.4) | |
| A reaction: This is a nice satirical counterexample to the Rawlsian claim that 'undeserved inequalities should somehow be compensated for' [Rawls 1971: 100]. See also Kurt Vonnegut's story 'Harrison Bergeron'. |
| 23121 | It is just a fact that some people are morally better than others [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: It is an obviolus fact that some people are morally better than others and that some are morally worse. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 10.4) | |
| A reaction: This could be conceded, without then asserting that the moral ones are superior, or more deserving. That is a social strategy, rather than a fact. We can challenge the criteria for 'morally better', but we can't deny a rankng once it is agreed. |
| 23105 | It is not deplorable that billionaires have more than millionaires [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: It is certainly not intuitively deplorable that billionaires have more money than millionaires. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 05.3) | |
| A reaction: Nice point. His claim is that sufficiency is the important feature, and equality is largely irrelevant. The reality, though, is that the billionaires, unlike the millionaires, could solve the insufficiency problem. |
| 23120 | The problem is basic insufficiency of resources, not their inequality [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: If everyone has sufficient resources, it is not objectionable that some have more than others. What is objectionable is that some do not have enough. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 10.3) | |
| A reaction: Reasonable, but there seems to be sharp disagreement between the haves and the have-nots over what counts as 'enough'. In an affluent country, does enough include a car, restaurant dining, and foreign holidays? Or just food and shelter? |
| 23108 | Justice combines consistency and desert; treat likes alike, judging likeness by desert [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Justice is a combination of consistency and desert. Like cases should be treated alike, and likenesses should be evaluated according to desert. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 06.3) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] He needs to add that at least the desert should be relevant to the events being assessed. Should people not get a fair trial if they are branded as generally 'undeserving'? Hence the case must be judged before the desert is identified. |
| 23083 | Liberal welfare focuses on need rather than desert [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: In welfare legislation, liberals concentrate on what people need rather than on what they deserve. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 01,2) | |
| A reaction: He makes assessing what people 'deserve' sound easy. Do drowning people deserve to be rescued? Do billionaires deserve their wealth (which is not the same as 'did they acquire it legally')? What do rude people deserve? |
| 11150 | It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain an idea without accepting it [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain an idea without accepting it. | |
| From: Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) | |
| A reaction: The epigraph on a David Chalmers website. A wonderful remark, and it should be on the wall of every beginners' philosophy class. However, while it is in the spirit of Aristotle, it appears to be a misattribution with no ancient provenance. |
| 3037 | Aristotle said the educated were superior to the uneducated as the living are to the dead [Aristotle, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle was asked how much educated men were superior to those uneducated; "As much," he said, "as the living are to the dead." | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 05.1.11 |
| 8151 | Let your teacher be a god to you [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: Let your teacher be a god to you. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Taittiriya') | |
| A reaction: Yes indeed. The problem in the west is that we are committed to encouraging a critical and questioning attitude. A high value for knowledge must precede a high value for a teacher. |
| 23113 | Sexual morality doesn't require monogamy, but it needs a group of sensible regulations [Kekes] |
| Full Idea: A moral tradition need not be committed to monogamy, but it must regulate sexual conduct to prevent inbreeding, protect the sexually immature, prohibit some forms of coercion, and assign responsibility for raising children. | |
| From: John Kekes (Against Liberalism [1997], 08.1) | |
| A reaction: Wise words, I would say. The sexual liberation which arose with the contraceptive pill rather swamped thoughts of this type. These are just sensible responses to the facts of life. |
| 8660 | There are potential infinities (never running out), but actual infinity is incoherent [Aristotle, by Friend] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle developed his own distinction between potential infinity (never running out) and actual infinity (there being a collection of an actual infinite number of things, such as places, times, objects). He decided that actual infinity was incoherent. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Michèle Friend - Introducing the Philosophy of Mathematics 1.3 | |
| A reaction: Friend argues, plausibly, that this won't do, since potential infinity doesn't make much sense if there is not an actual infinity of things to supply the demand. It seems to just illustrate how boggling and uncongenial infinity was to Aristotle. |
| 12058 | Aristotle's matter can become any other kind of matter [Aristotle, by Wiggins] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle's conception of matter permits any kind of matter to become any other kind of matter. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by David Wiggins - Substance 4.11.2 | |
| A reaction: This is obviously crucial background information when we read Aristotle on matter. Our 92+ elements, and fixed fundamental particles, gives a quite different picture. Aristotle would discuss form and matter quite differently now. |
| 8153 | By knowing one piece of clay or gold, you know all of clay or gold [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: By knowing one lump of clay, all things made of clay are known; by knowing a nugget of gold, all things made of gold are known. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Chandogya') | |
| A reaction: I can't think of a better basic definition of a natural kind. There is an inductive assumption, of course, which hits trouble when you meet fool's gold, or two different sorts of jade. But the concept of a natural kind is no more than this. |
| 8154 | Originally there must have been just Existence, which could not come from non-existence [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: In the beginning there was Existence, One only, without a second. Some say that in the beginning there was non-existence only, and that out of that the universe was born. But how could such a thing be? How could existence be born of non-existence? | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Chandogya') | |
| A reaction: A very rare instance of an argument in the Upanishads, arising out of a disagreement. The monotheistic religions have preferred to make God the eternal element, presumably because that raises his status, but is also explains the start as a decision. |
| 8148 | Brahma, supreme god and protector of the universe, arose from the ocean of existence [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: Out of the infinite ocean of existence arose Brahma, first-born and foremost among the gods. From him sprang the universe, and he became its protector. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Mundaka') | |
| A reaction: Brahma does not have eternal (or necessary) existence. Could Brahma cease to exist? I suppose we cannot ask what caused the appearance of Brahma? Is it part of a plan, or just luck, or some sort of necessity? |
| 8144 | Brahman is the Uncaused Cause [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: Brahman is the Uncaused Cause. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Katha') | |
| A reaction: This precedes Aquinas (Idea 1430) by over two thousand years. The theological trick is to admit one Uncaused Cause, but somehow exclude further instances, such as my bicycle getting a puncture. Does this undermine the Principle of Sufficient Reason? |
| 8152 | Earth, food, fire, sun are all forms of Brahman [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: Earth, food, fire, sun - all these that you worship - are forms of Brahman. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Chandogya') | |
| A reaction: In 'Taittiriya' food is named as the "chief of all things". Pantheism seems to arise from a desire that one's god should have every conceivable good, so in addition to power and knowledge, your god must keep you warm and healthy. |
| 22729 | The concepts of gods arose from observing the soul, and the cosmos [Aristotle, by Sext.Empiricus] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle said that the conception of gods arose among mankind from two originating causes, namely from events which concern the soul and from celestial phenomena. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE], Frag 10) by Sextus Empiricus - Against the Physicists (two books) I.20 | |
| A reaction: The cosmos suggests order, and possible creation. What do events of the soul suggest? It doesn't seem to be its non-physical nature, because Aristotle is more of a functionalist. Puzzling. (It says later that gods are like the soul). |
| 8156 | The gods are not worshipped for their own sake, but for the sake of the Self [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: It is not for the sake of the gods, my beloved, that the gods are worshipped, but for the sake of the Self (Atman). | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Brihadaranyaka') | |
| A reaction: There is an uneasy selfish streak in all religions, which conflicts with their exhorations to altruism, and to the love of the gods. It also occurs in the exhortation of Socrates to be virtuous. 'Pure' altruism seems only to arise in the 18th century. |
| 8157 | A man with desires is continually reborn, until his desires are stilled [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: A man acts according to desires; after death he reaps the harvest of his deeds, and returns again to the world of action. Thus he who has desires continues subject to rebirth, but he in who desire is stilled suffers no rebirth. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Brihadaranyaka') | |
| A reaction: I greatly prefer the Stoic idea (Idea 3066) that we should live according to nature, to this perverse longing to completely destroy our own nature and become something we are not. Play the cards you are dealt, which include desires. |
| 8159 | Damayata - be self-controlled! Datta - be charitable! Dayadhwam - be compassionate! [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: The storm-clouds thunder: Da! Da! Da! Damayata - be self-controlled! Datta - be charitable! Dayadhwam - be compassionate! | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Brihadaranyaka') | |
| A reaction: Compassion seems to imply charity, so it comes down to 'Be self-controlled and compassionate'. Only the wildest romantic could be against self-control. Only Nietzsche could be against compassion (Idea 4425). |
| 8145 | Those ignorant of Atman return as animals or plants, according to their merits [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: Of those ignorant of the Self (Atman), some enter into beings possessed of wombs, others enter into plants - according to their deeds and the growth of their intelligence. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Katha') | |
| A reaction: "I sigh and sigh, and wish I were a tree" wrote George Herbert. You probably need the snobbery of the Indian caste system to appreciate the horrors of low rebirth. I quite fancy being a dolphin, but a tulip would be all right. |
| 8149 | Charity and ritual observance distract from the highest good of religion [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: Considering religion to be observance of rituals and performance of acts of charity, the deluded remain ignorant of the highest good. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Mundaka') | |
| A reaction: An important reminder. In all the great religious texts the exhortation to love and charity is a minor aspect. The point is to live on a spiritual plain, attempting to relate the world of God/the gods. Daily life is either secondary or irrelevant. |
| 8158 | Do not seek to know Brahman by arguments, for arguments are idle and vain [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: Do not seek to know Brahman by arguments, for arguments are idle and vain. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Brihadaranyaka') | |
| A reaction: In the end all the religions seem to gravitate towards fideism and away from reasoned argument. The Catholic Church may be the last bastion of rational theology. Islam (10th cent), Protestantism (16th) and Judaism (17th) all rejected philosophy. |
| 8146 | The immortal in us is the part that never sleeps, and shapes our dreams [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: That which is awake in us even while we sleep, shaping in dream the objects of our desire - that indeed is pure, that is Brahman, and that verily is called the Immortal. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Katha') | |
| A reaction: That is a more helpful view of what the soul might be than anything found in Christian theology. It makes it the essence of the everyday Self. It is left with the difficulty of lacking individuality, and being of limited interest to my wider Self. |
| 8150 | The immortal Self and the sad individual self are like two golden birds perched on one tree [Anon (Upan)] |
| Full Idea: Like two birds of golden plumage, the individual self and the immortal Self perch on the branches of the same tree. The individual self, deluded by forgetfulness of his identity with the divine self, bewildered by his ego, grieves and is sad. | |
| From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Mundaka') | |
| A reaction: Hinduism gives a much clearer and bolder picture of the soul than Christianity does. I don't see much consolation in the immortality of the wonderful Self, if my individual self is doomed to misery and extinction. Which one is me? |