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3238
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'Dead person' isn't a contradiction, so 'person' is somewhat vague [Williams,B]
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Full Idea:
If we say (in opposition to a physical view of identity) that when Jones dies 'Jones ceases to exist' but 'Jones' body does not cease to exist', this shouldn't be pressed too hard, because it would make 'dead person' a contradiction.
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From:
Bernard Williams (Are Persons Bodies? [1970], p.74)
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A reaction:
A good point, which nicely challenges the distinction between a 'human' and a 'person', but the problem case is much more the one where Jones gets advanced Alzheimer's, rather than dies. A dead body ceases as a mechanism, as well as as a personality.
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3239
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You can only really love a person as a token, not as a type [Williams,B]
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Full Idea:
If you love a person as a type instead of as a token (i.e. a "person", instead of a physical body) you might prefer a run-down copy of them to no person at all, but at this point our idea of loving a person begins to crack.
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From:
Bernard Williams (Are Persons Bodies? [1970], p.81)
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A reaction:
Very persuasive. If you love a person you can cope with them getting old. If you own an original watercolour, you can accept that it fades, but you would replace a reproduction of it if that faded. But what, then, is it that you love?
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7563
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The old 'influx' view of causation says it is a flow of accidental properties from A to B [Suárez, by Jolley]
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Full Idea:
The 'influx' model of causation says that causes involve a process of contagion, as it were; when the kettle boils, the gas infects the water inside the kettle with its own 'individual accident' of heat, which literally flows from one to the other.
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From:
report of Francisco Suárez (works [1588]) by Nicholas Jolley - Leibniz Ch.2
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A reaction:
This nicely captures the scholastic target of Hume's sceptical thinking on the subject. However, see Idea 2542, where the idea of influx has had a revival. It is hard to see how the water could change if it didn't 'catch' something from the gas.
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15251
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The attribution of necessity to causation is either primitive animism, or confusion with logical necessity [Ayer]
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Full Idea:
How are we to explain the word 'must' [about causation]? The answer is, I think, that it is either a relic of animism, or else reveals an inclination to treat causal connexion as if it were a form of logical necessity.
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From:
A.J. Ayer (The Foundations of Empirical Knowledge [1940], IV.18)
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A reaction:
The animism proposal just about makes sense (as a primitive feature of minds), but why would anyone, if they had the time and understanding, dream of treating a regular connection as a 'logical' necessity?
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