Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Ethical Studies', 'Identity through Possible Worlds' and 'De Cive'

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4 ideas

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

11966	If there are essential properties, how do you find out what they are? [Chisholm]
	Full Idea: It seems to me that if Adam does have essential properties, there is no procedure at all for finding out what they are.
	From: Roderick Chisholm (Identity through Possible Worlds [1967], p.85)
	A reaction: My tentative suggestion is that the essential properties are those which explain the nature, power, function and role of Adam in the 'actual' world. Whatever possibilities he acquires, he had better retain the capacity to be the First Man.

10. Modality / E. Possible worlds / 3. Transworld Objects / a. Transworld identity

11965	Could possible Adam gradually transform into Noah, and vice versa? [Chisholm]
	Full Idea: If Adam lived for 931 years in a possible world, instead of his actual 930 years, ..then Adam and Noah could gradually exchange their ages and other properties...and we could trace Adam in a world back to the actual Noah, and vice versa.
	From: Roderick Chisholm (Identity through Possible Worlds [1967], p.81-2)
	A reaction: [very compressed] Chisholm was one of the first to raise this problem for possible worlds, though it had been Quine's objection to modal logic all along. Only Adam having essential properties seems to stop this slippery slope, says Chisholm.

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).

25. Social Practice / E. Policies / 1. War / c. Combatants

23609	I act justly if I follow my Prince in an apparently unjust war, and refusing to fight would be injustice [Hobbes]
	Full Idea: If I wage war at the commandment of my Prince, conceiving the war to be justly undertaken, I do not therefore do unjustly, but rather if I refuse to do it, arrogating to myself the knowledge of what is just and unjust, which pertains only to my Prince.
	From: Thomas Hobbes (De Cive [1642], 12.II), quoted by Jeff McMahan - Killing in War 2.6
	A reaction: Hobbes early says that Princes make things just by commanding them. This presumably assumes divine authority in the Prince. This is, of course, ancient pernicious nonsense.