Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Saundaranandakavya', 'How free does the will need to be?' and 'Bertrand Russell: Spirit of Solitude'

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6 ideas

1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 2. Invocation to Philosophy

7910	Pursue truth with the urgency of someone whose clothes are on fire [Ashvaghosha]
	Full Idea: As though your turban or your clothes were on fire, so with a sense of urgency should you apply your intellect to the comprehension of the truths.
	From: Ashvaghosha (Saundaranandakavya [c.50], XVI)
	A reaction: The best philosophers need no such urging. I retain a romantic view that we should be 'natural' in these things. See Plato's views in Idea 2153 and 1638. However, maybe I should be confronted with this quotation every morning when I awake.

18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 6. Judgement / a. Nature of Judgement

7535	If all beliefs are propositional, then belief and judgement are the same thing [Monk]
	Full Idea: Whether the words 'belief' and 'judgement' mean the same thing is a moot point. Traditionally, a judgement is the assent of mind to a proposition. If one thinks that all beliefs are propositional, then beliefs and judgements are the same thing.
	From: Ray Monk (Bertrand Russell: Spirit of Solitude [1996], Ch.19 n6)
	A reaction: If I think I have put a bit too much toothpaste on my brush, that strikes me as a non-propositional judgement, even though it could be spelled out as a proposition. But it also strikes me as a belief.

22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 1. Nature of Ethics / g. Moral responsibility

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?

29. Religion / C. Spiritual Disciplines / 3. Buddhism

7909	The Eightfold Path concerns morality, wisdom, and tranquillity [Ashvaghosha]
	Full Idea: The Eightfold Path has three steps concerning morality - right speech, right bodily action, and right livelihood; three of wisdom - right views, right intentions, and right effort; and two of tranquillity - right mindfulness and right concentration.
	From: Ashvaghosha (Saundaranandakavya [c.50], XVI)
	A reaction: Most of this translates quite comfortably into the aspirations of western philosophy. For example, 'right effort' sounds like Kant's claim that only a good will is truly good (Idea 3710). The Buddhist division is interesting for action theory.

29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 2. Immortality / d. Heaven

7908	At the end of a saint, he is not located in space, but just ceases to be disturbed [Ashvaghosha]
	Full Idea: When an accomplished saint comes to the end, he does not go anywhere down in the earth or up in the sky, nor into any of the directions of space, but because his defilements have become extinct he simply ceases to be disturbed.
	From: Ashvaghosha (Saundaranandakavya [c.50], XVI)
	A reaction: To 'cease to be disturbed' is the most attractive account of heaven I have encountered. It all sounds a bit dull though. I wonder, as usual, how they know all this stuff.