6 ideas
| 5021 | An idea is analysed perfectly when it is shown a priori that it is possible [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: Every idea is analysed perfectly only when it is demonstrated a priori that it is possible. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (Of Organum or Ars Magna of Thinking [1679], p.3) | |
| A reaction: I take it he means metaphysical possibility, rather than natural, or we can't think about pigs flying. He probably has maths in mind. Seeing the possibility of something may well amount to understanding its truth conditions. |
| 5020 | Our thoughts are either dependent, or self-evident. All thoughts seem to end in the self-evident [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: Whatever is thought by us is either conceived through itself, or involves the concept of another. …Thus one must proceed to infinity, or all thoughts are resolved into those which are conceived through themselves. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (Of Organum or Ars Magna of Thinking [1679], p.1) | |
| A reaction: This seems to embody the rationalist attitude to foundations. I am sympathetic. Experiences just come to us as basic, but they don't qualify as 'thoughts', let alone knowledge. Experiences are more 'given' than 'conceptual'. |
| 18552 | Forget about beauty; just concentrate on the virtues of delicacy and discernment admired in critics [Hume, by Scruton] |
| Full Idea: Hume suggest we get away from the fruitless discussion of beauty, and simply concentrate on the qualities we admire, and ought to admire, in a critic - qualities such as delicacy and discernment. | |
| From: report of David Hume (Of the standard of taste [1757]) by Roger Scruton - Beauty: a very short introduction 6 | |
| A reaction: We might wonder how you can admire 'discernment' without some view of the thing being discern, which is in danger of being beauty. How do you judge delicacy and discernment without judging the objects of the critic's taste? Mere authority? |
| 6608 | Strong sense, delicate sentiment, practice, comparisons, and lack of prejudice, are all needed for good taste [Hume] |
| Full Idea: Strong sense, united to delicate sentiment, improved by practice, perfected by comparison, and cleared of all prejudice, can alone entitle critics to the valuable character of having 'taste'. | |
| From: David Hume (Of the standard of taste [1757]), quoted by Robert Fogelin - Walking the Tightrope of Reason Ch.6 | |
| A reaction: I agree entirely with this, but then I am a very politically incorrect elitist when it comes to taste. It just seems screamingly obvious that professional wine-tasters have a better appreciation of wine than me, and so on for the rest of the arts. |
| 5996 | Critolaus redefined Aristotle's moral aim as fulfilment instead of happiness [Critolaus, by White,SA] |
| Full Idea: Critolaus reformulated Aristotelian theory by defining happiness as a 'fulfilment' (sumplêrôma) of psychic, physical, and external goods, where virtue vastly outweighs the rest. | |
| From: report of Critolaus (fragments/reports [c.170 BCE]) by Stephen A. White - Critolaus | |
| A reaction: The sounds more like an attempt at clarification than a real change of Peripatetic doctrine. Occasionally 'fulfilment' is offered as a translation for eudaimonia. Maybe we should just take up Critolaus' suggestion when we are discussing Aristotle. |
| 5019 | Supreme human happiness is the greatest possible increase of his perfection [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: The supreme happiness of man consists in the greatest possible increase of his perfection. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (Of Organum or Ars Magna of Thinking [1679], p.1) | |
| A reaction: I fear that (being a great intellectual) he had a rather intellectual interpretation of 'perfection'. This is in danger of being a tautology, but if the proposal is given an Aritotelian slant I am sympathetic. |