9 ideas
| 3444 | If actions are not caused by other events, and are not causeless, they must be caused by the person [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: If the action is not caused by some other event, and it is not causeless, this leaves the possibility that it is caused by something else instead, and this something can only be the agent, the man. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Human Freedom and the Self [1964], p.28) |
| 3446 | For Hobbes (but not for Kant) a person's actions can be deduced from their desires and beliefs [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: According to Hobbes, if we fully know what a man desires and believes, and we know the state of his physical stimuli, we may logically deduce what he will try to do. But Kant says no such statements can ever imply what a man will do. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Human Freedom and the Self [1964], p.32) |
| 9268 | If free will miraculously interrupts causation, animals might do that; why would we want to do it? [Frankfurt on Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Chisholm holds the quaint doctrine that human freedom entails an absence of causal determination; a free action is a miracle. This gives no basis for doubting that animals have such freedom; and why would we care whether we can interrupt the causal order? | |
| From: comment on Roderick Chisholm (Human Freedom and the Self [1964]) by Harry G. Frankfurt - Freedom of the Will and concept of a person §IV | |
| A reaction: [compressed] Chisholm is the spokesman for 'agent causation', Frankfurt for freedom as second-level volitions. I'm with Frankfurt. The belief in 'agents' and 'free will' may sound plausible, until the proposal is spelled out in causal terms. |
| 3442 | Responsibility seems to conflict with events being either caused or not caused [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: The free will problem is that humans seem to be responsible, but this seems to conflict with the idea that every event is caused by some other event, and it also conflicts with the view that the action is not caused at all. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Human Freedom and the Self [1964], p.24) |
| 3443 | Desires may rule us, but are we responsible for our desires? [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: If a flood of desires causes a weak-willed man to give in to temptation, …the question now becomes, is he responsible for the beliefs and desires he happens to have? | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Human Freedom and the Self [1964], p.25) |
| 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? |
| 3445 | Causation among objects relates either events or states [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Between natural objects we may say that causation is a relation between events or states of affairs. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Human Freedom and the Self [1964], p.28) |
| 11945 | In addition to laws, God must also create appropriate natures for things [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: It isn't sufficient to say that God has made a general law, for in addition to the decree there has also to be a natural way of carrying it out. It is necessary, that is, that what happens should be explicable in terms of the God-given nature of things. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (Letter to the Editor about Bayle [1698], p.205) | |
| A reaction: Thus Leibniz is an ancestor of scientific essentialism, but he was too frightened to take the next step, which is to see that once God has endowed the natures, he doesn't need to wield his laws as well. The natures will do the whole job. |
| 19348 | All that is real in motion is the force or power which produces change [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: As for motion, what is real in it is force or power; that is to say, what there is in the present state which carries with it a change in the future. The rest is only phenomena and relations. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (Letter to the Editor about Bayle [1698], §13) | |
| A reaction: This presumably contradicts Newton's concept of inertia, which allows constant motion without force. I always like a reference to powers. What is 'kinetic energy' in this context? |