Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Personal Identity and Individuation' and 'The Courtier and the Heretic'

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3 ideas

16. Persons / D. Continuity of the Self / 2. Mental Continuity / b. Self as mental continuity
The memory criterion has a problem when one thing branches into two things [Williams,B, by Macdonald,C]
     Full Idea: The memory criterion for personal identity permits 'branching' (where two things can later meet the criteria of persistence of a single earlier thing), which presents it with serious problems.
     From: report of Bernard Williams (Personal Identity and Individuation [1956]) by Cynthia Macdonald - Varieties of Things Ch.4
     A reaction: Of course, any notion of personal identity would have serious problem if people could branch into two, like fissioning amoeba. If that happened, we probably wouldn't have had a strong notion of personal identity in the first place. See Parfit.
21. Aesthetics / C. Artistic Issues / 7. Art and Morality
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?
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 10. Theocracy
The politics of Leibniz was the reunification of Christianity [Stewart,M]
     Full Idea: The politics of Leibniz may be summed up in one word: theocracy. The specific agenda motivating much of his work was to reunite the Protestant and Catholic churches
     From: Matthew Stewart (The Courtier and the Heretic [2007], Ch. 5)
     A reaction: This would be a typical project for a rationalist philosopher, who thinks that good reasoning will gradually converge on the one truth.