Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Commentary on 'De Anima'', 'Prolegomena to Ethics' and 'Making It Explicit'

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5 ideas

3. Truth / C. Correspondence Truth / 2. Correspondence to Facts
10355 Facts can't make claims true, because they are true claims [Brandom, by Kusch]
     Full Idea: Brandom says that facts do not make claims true, because facts simply are true claims.
     From: report of Robert B. Brandom (Making It Explicit [1994], p.327) by Martin Kusch - Knowledge by Agreement Ch.18
     A reaction: Nice. Notoriously, anyone defending the correspondence theory of truth in terms of facts had better say what they mean by a 'fact'. Personally I take a fact to be a non-verbal, mind-independent situation in the world, so I disagree with Brandom.
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / a. Idealistic ethics
23035 The good life aims at perfections, or absolute laws, or what is absolutely desirable [Green,TH]
     Full Idea: The differentia of the good life …is controlled by the consciousness of there being some perfection which has to be fulfilled, some law which has to be obeyed, something absolutely desirable whatever the individual may for the time desire.
     From: T.H. Green (Prolegomena to Ethics [1882], p.134), quoted by John H. Muirhead - The Service of the State II
     A reaction: The 'perfection' suggests Plato, and the 'law' suggests Kant. The idea that something is 'absolutely desirable' is, I suspect, aimed at the utilitarians, who don't care what is desired. I'm no idealist, but have some sympathy with this idea.
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.
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 6. Liberalism / c. Liberal equality
23037 People are improved by egalitarian institutions and habits [Green,TH]
     Full Idea: Man has bettered himself through institutions and habits which tend to make the welfare of all the welfare of each.
     From: T.H. Green (Prolegomena to Ethics [1882], p.180), quoted by John H. Muirhead - The Service of the State II
     A reaction: I like this a lot. We underestimate how the best social values are promoted by the existence of enlightened institutions, rather than by preaching and teaching. Schools, law courts and churche embody their values.
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 6. Liberalism / e. Liberal community
23043 All talk of the progress of a nation must reduce to the progress of its individual members [Green,TH]
     Full Idea: Our ultimate standard of worth is an ideal of personal worth. All other values are relative to personal values. To speak of any progress of a nation or society or mankind except as relative to some greater worth of persons is to use words without meaning.
     From: T.H. Green (Prolegomena to Ethics [1882], p.193), quoted by John H. Muirhead - The Service of the State II
     A reaction: Note that, pre-verificationism, a Victorian talks of plausible words actually being meaningless. This is a good statement of the core doctrine of liberalism.