Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Ethical Studies', 'Principles of Politics' and 'The Evolution of Physics'

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4 ideas

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).

24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 6. Liberalism / b. Liberal individualism

22595	Liberty is the triumph of the individual, over both despotic government and enslaving majorities [Constant]
	Full Idea: Lliberty is the triumph of the individual, as much over a government which seeks to rule by despotic methods, as over the masses who seek to render the minority the slave of the majority.
	From: Benjamin Constant (Principles of Politics [1806]), quoted by Ian Dunt - How to be a Liberal 4
	A reaction: [No page given] Dunt describes Constant's book as the first really systematic account of liberalism. Very important to have rights against the majority, as well as against government.

24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 6. Liberalism / c. Liberal equality

22597	Minority rights are everyone's rights, because we all have turns in the minority [Constant]
	Full Idea: To defend the rights of minorities is to defend the rights of all. Everyone in turn finds himself in the minority.
	From: Benjamin Constant (Principles of Politics [1806]), quoted by Ian Dunt - How to be a Liberal 4
	A reaction: Very conformist people, who are often the most oppressive, are rarely in the minority, and are unlikely to be impressed by this idea.

27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 2. Electrodynamics / b. Fields

18202	The concept of a field gradually replaced the substances in explaining relations between charges [Einstein/Infeld]
	Full Idea: In the beginning the field concept was no more than a means of facilitating the understanding of phenomena. ...In the new field language it is the field and not the charges themselves which is essential. The substance was overshadowed by the field.
	From: Einstein,A/Infeld,L (The Evolution of Physics [1938], p.151), quoted by Penelope Maddy - Naturalism in Mathematics II.4
	A reaction: This is very important for philosophical metaphysicians, especially those like me who want to explain the universe by the nature of the stuff that composes it. The 'stuff' had better not be simplistic individual 'substances'.