Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Commentary on 'De Anima'', 'Philosophy' and 'Presentation of Self in Everyday Life'

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4 ideas

11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 7. Knowledge First

23888	Knowledge is beyond question, as an unavoidable component of thinking [Weil]
	Full Idea: The speaker refuses to pose the question of knowledge, since knowledge is a given that is mixed with thought, and that no thinking being can get away from.
	From: Simone Weil (Philosophy [1941], p.42)
	A reaction: On the whole I favour belief-first, but I take the primary purpose of minds to be navigation, and that needs facts, not hopeful beliefs. Weil's thought pushes me a bit towards the knowledge first view.

16. Persons / E. Rejecting the Self / 2. Self as Social Construct

8044	Goffman sees the self as no more than a peg on which to hang roles we play [Goffman, by MacIntyre]
	Full Idea: Erving Goffman has liquidated the self into its role-playing, arguing that the self is no more than 'a peg' on which the clothes of the role are hung.
	From: report of Erving Goffman (Presentation of Self in Everyday Life [1959]) by Alasdair MacIntyre - After Virtue: a Study in Moral Theory Ch.3
	A reaction: A rather unsympathetic expression of his view, but it seems to be a widely held view among students of sociology. But then sociologists are almost committed a priori to a social and relativist view of truth, persons, knowledge, religion etc.

21. Aesthetics / B. Nature of Art / 1. Defining Art

23887	Art (like philosophy) establishes a relation between world and self, and between oneself and others [Weil]
	Full Idea: Isn't true art a method for establishing a certain relation between the world and the self, and between oneself and others, and isn't that the equivalent of philosophy?
	From: Simone Weil (Philosophy [1941], p.38)
	A reaction: I hope the definition of 'true' art doesn't have to conform to achieving this relation. I suppose each good work of art shows you a distinctive way of relating to the world. An interesting thought (as so often with this thinker).

22. Metaethics / B. Value / 2. Values / e. Death

16764	The soul conserves the body, as we see by its dissolution when the soul leaves [Toletus]
	Full Idea: Every accident of a living thing, as well as all its organs and temperaments and its dispositions are conserved by the soul. We see this from experience, since when that soul recedes, all these dissolve and become corrupted.
	From: Franciscus Toletus (Commentary on 'De Anima' [1572], II.1.1), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 24.5
	A reaction: A nice example of observing a phenemonon, but not being able to observe the dependence relation the right way round. Compare Descartes in Idea 16763.