Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'The Logic of Boundaryless Concepts' and 'Persons, Character and Morality'

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6 ideas

5. Theory of Logic / A. Overview of Logic / 3. Value of Logic

9390	Logic guides thinking, but it isn't a substitute for it [Rumfitt]
	Full Idea: Logic is part of a normative theory of thinking, not a substitute for thinking.
	From: Ian Rumfitt (The Logic of Boundaryless Concepts [2007], p.13)
	A reaction: There is some sort of logicians' dream, going back to Leibniz, of a reasoning engine, which accepts propositions and outputs inferences. I agree with this idea. People who excel at logic are often, it seems to me, modest at philosophy.

9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 3. Unity Problems / e. Vague objects

9389	Vague membership of sets is possible if the set is defined by its concept, not its members [Rumfitt]
	Full Idea: Vagueness in respect of membership is consistency with determinacy of the set's identity, so long as a set's identity is taken to consist, not in its having such-and-such members, but in its being the extension of a concept.
	From: Ian Rumfitt (The Logic of Boundaryless Concepts [2007], p.5)
	A reaction: I find this view of sets much more appealing than the one that identifies a set with its members. The empty set is less of a problem, as well as non-existents. Logicians prefer the extensional view because it is tidy.

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?

23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / e. Character

23279	It is important that a person can change their character, and not just be successive 'selves' [Williams,B]
	Full Idea: I want to emphasise the basic importance of the ordinary idea of a self or person which undergoes changes of character, as opposed to dissolving a changing person into a series of 'selves'.
	From: Bernard Williams (Persons, Character and Morality [1976], II)
	A reaction: [compressed] He mentions Derek Parfit for the rival view. Williams has the Aristotelian view, that a person has an essential nature, which endures through change, and explains that change. But that needs some non-essential character traits.

23280	Kantians have an poor account of individuals, and insist on impartiality, because they ignore character [Williams,B]
	Full Idea: The Kantians' omission of character is a condition of their ultimate insistence on the demands of impartial morality, just as it is a reason to find inadequate their account of the individual.
	From: Bernard Williams (Persons, Character and Morality [1976], II)
	A reaction: This is also why the Kantian account of virtue is inadequate, in comparison with the Aristotelian view.

23. Ethics / E. Utilitarianism / 1. Utilitarianism

23278	For utilitarians states of affairs are what have value, not matter who produced them [Williams,B]
	Full Idea: The basic bearer of value for Utilitarianism is the state of affairs, and hence, when the relevant causal differences have been allowed for, it cannot make any further difference who produces a given state of affairs.
	From: Bernard Williams (Persons, Character and Morality [1976], I)
	A reaction: Which is morally better, that I water your bed of flowers, or that it rains? Which is morally better, that I water them from love, or because you threaten me with a whip?