Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Anarchical Fallacies: on the Declaration of Rights' and 'On the Pragmatics of Communications'

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4 ideas

19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 6. Meaning as Use
To understand language is to know how to use it to reach shared understandings [Habermas]
     Full Idea: One simply would not know what it is to understand the meaning of a linguistic expression if one did not know how one could make use of it in order to reach understanding with someone about something.
     From: Jürgen Habermas (On the Pragmatics of Communications [1998], p.228), quoted by James Gordon Finlayson - Habermas Ch.3:34
     A reaction: Not offered as a 'theory of meaning', and certainly plausible. Compare a hammer, though: a proper understanding is that it is used to exert a sharp force, but you can take in its structure and nature before you spot its usage.
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 / A. Basis of a State / 3. Natural Values / c. Natural rights
Natural rights are nonsense, and unspecified natural rights is nonsense on stilts [Bentham]
     Full Idea: Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense — nonsense upon stilts.
     From: Jeremy Bentham (Anarchical Fallacies: on the Declaration of Rights [1796])
     A reaction: If you want your opinion to be remembered, express it memorably! I take natural rights to be the basic principles and values which are obvious to almost everyone when they come for formulate legal rights (which are the only true rights).
25. Social Practice / C. Rights / 1. Basis of Rights
Only laws can produce real rights; rights from 'law of nature' are imaginary [Bentham]
     Full Idea: Right, the substantive right, is the child of law; from real laws come real rights; but from imaginary laws, from 'law of nature' can come only imaginary rights.
     From: Jeremy Bentham (Anarchical Fallacies: on the Declaration of Rights [1796], II.523), quoted by Amartya Sen - The Idea of Justice 17 'Ethics'
     A reaction: I am coming to agree with this. What are called 'natural rights' are just self-evident good reasons why someone should be allowed a right. A right can, of course, come from an informal agreement. The question is: why award that particular legal right?