7 ideas
| 14305 | In the truth-functional account a burnt-up match was soluble because it never entered water [Carnap] |
| Full Idea: If a wooden match was completely burned up yesterday, and never placed in water at any time, is it not the case, therefore, that the match is soluble (in the truth-functional view). This follows just from the antecedent being false. | |
| From: Rudolph Carnap (Testability and Meaning [1937], I.440), quoted by Stephen Mumford - Dispositions | |
| A reaction: This, along with Edgington's nice example of the conditional command (Idea ) seems conclusive against the truth-functional account. The only defence possible is some sort of pragmatic account about implicature. |
| 19087 | The meaning or purport of a symbol is all the rational conduct it would lead to [Peirce] |
| Full Idea: The entire intellectual purport of any symbol consists in the total of all modes of rational conduct which, conditionally upon all the possible different circumstances and desires, would ensue upon the acceptance of the symbol. | |
| From: Charles Sanders Peirce (Issues of Pragmaticism [1905], EP ii.246), quoted by Danielle Macbeth - Pragmatism and Objective Truth p.169 n1 | |
| A reaction: Macbeth says pragmatism is founded on this theory of meaning, rather than on a theory of truth. I don't see why the causes of a symbol shouldn't be as much a part of its meaning as the consequences are. |
| 22445 | Morality shows murder is wrong, but not what counts as a murder [Foot] |
| Full Idea: While one can determine from the concept of morality that there is an objection to murder one cannot determine completely what will count as murder. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Morality and Art [1972], p.7) | |
| A reaction: She then refers to abortion, but there are military and criminal problem cases, and killings by neglect or side effect. |
| 22444 | A moral system must deal with the dangers and benefits of life [Foot] |
| Full Idea: A moral system seems necessarily to be one aimed at removing particular dangers and securing certain benefits. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Morality and Art [1972], p.6) | |
| A reaction: I thoroughly approve of this approach to morality, which anchors it in real life, rather than in ideals or principles of reason. |
| 22447 | Saying something 'just is' right or wrong creates an illusion of fact and objectivity [Foot] |
| Full Idea: When we say that something 'just is' right or wrong we want to give the impression of some kind of fact or authority standing behind our words, ...maintaining the trappings of objectivity though the substance is not there. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Morality and Art [1972], p.9) | |
| A reaction: Foot favours the idea that such a claim must depend on reasons, and that the reasons arise out of actual living. She's right. |
| 22448 | We sometimes just use the word 'should' to impose a rule of conduct on someone [Foot] |
| Full Idea: It would be more honest to recognise that the 'should' of moral judgement is sometimes merely an instrument by which we (for our own very good reasons) try to impose a rule of conduct even on the uncaring man? | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Morality and Art [1972], p.18) | |
| A reaction: This is a good example, I think, of the ordinary language tradition that Foot grew up in. We load a word like 'should' with a mystical power, but the situations in which it is actually used bring us back down to earth. |
| 22446 | In the case of something lacking independence, calling it a human being is a matter of choice [Foot] |
| Full Idea: In the problem of abortion there is a genuine choice as to whether or not to count as a human being, with the rights of a human being, what would become a human being but is not yet capable of independent life. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Morality and Art [1972], p.7) | |
| A reaction: There must be some basis for the choice. We can't call a dead person a human being. Choosing to call a tiny zygote a human being seems very implausible. Pre-viability strikes me as implausible. |