Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Ethical Studies', 'Letters to De Vries' and 'Moral Dilemmas Revisited'

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4 ideas

9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 14. Knowledge of Essences

4869	Experience does not teach us any essences of things [Spinoza]
	Full Idea: Experience does not teach us any essences of things.
	From: Baruch de Spinoza (Letters to De Vries [1664], 1664?)
	A reaction: This, along with Leibniz's claim that experience cannot reveal necessities, may constitute a striking criticism of empiricism, but it invites the obvious reply 'so much the worse for essences'. An essence seems to be a theoretical concept, not a priori.

20. Action / C. Motives for Action / 5. Action Dilemmas / a. Dilemmas

22481	There is no restitution after a dilemma, if it only involved the agent, or just needed an explanation [Foot, by PG]
	Full Idea: The 'remainder' after a dilemma can't be a matter of apology and restitution, because the dilemma may only involve the agent's own life, and in the case of broken promises we only owe an explanation, if the breaking is justifiable.
	From: report of Philippa Foot (Moral Dilemmas Revisited [1995], p.183) by PG - Db (ideas)
	A reaction: But what if someone has been financially ruined by it? If the agent feels guilty about that, is getting over it the rational thing to do? (Foot says that is an new obligation, and not part of the original dilemma).

22482	I can't understand how someone can be necessarily wrong whatever he does [Foot]
	Full Idea: I do not see how …we can know how to interpret the idea of a situation in which someone will necessarily be wrong whatever he does.
	From: Philippa Foot (Moral Dilemmas Revisited [1995], p.188)
	A reaction: Seems right. If you think of hideous dilemmas (frequent in wartime), there must always be a right thing to do (or two equally right things to do), even if the outcome is fairly hideous. Just distinguish the right from the good.

22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 2. Happiness / d. Routes to happiness

5655	Happiness is not satisfaction of desires, but fulfilment of values [Bradley, by Scruton]
	Full Idea: For Bradley, the happiness of the individual is not to be understood in terms of his desires and needs, but rather in terms of his values - which is to say, in terms of those of his desires which he incorporates into his self.
	From: report of F.H. Bradley (Ethical Studies [1876]) by Roger Scruton - Short History of Modern Philosophy Ch.16
	A reaction: Good. Bentham will reduce the values to a further set of desires, so that a value is a complex (second-level?) desire. I prefer to think of values as judgements, but I like Scruton's phrase of 'incorporating into his self'. Kant take note (Idea 1452).