Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'How free does the will need to be?' and 'Letters to Leibniz'

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4 ideas

8. Modes of Existence / C. Powers and Dispositions / 4. Powers as Essence

12750	The question is whether force is self-sufficient in bodies, and essential, or dependent on something [Lenfant]
	Full Idea: The whole question is to know if the force to act in bodies is in matter something distinct and independent of everything else that one conceives there. Without that, this force cannot be its essence, and will remain the result of some primitive quality.
	From: Jacques Lenfant (Letters to Leibniz [1693], 1693.11.07), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 8
	A reaction: This challenge to Leibniz highlights the drama of trying to simultaneously arrive at explanations of things, and to decide the nature of essence. Leibniz replied that force is primitive, because it is the 'principle' of behaviour and dispositions.

21. Aesthetics / C. Artistic Issues / 7. Art and Morality

468	Musical performance can reveal a range of virtues [Damon of Ath.]
	Full Idea: In singing and playing the lyre, a boy will be likely to reveal not only courage and moderation, but also justice.
	From: Damon (fragments/reports [c.460 BCE], B4), quoted by (who?) - where?

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?