Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'The Value of Science', 'Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro' and 'The Nature of Musical Expression'

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7 ideas

1. Philosophy / G. Scientific Philosophy / 3. Scientism

7068	If infatuation with science leads to bad scientism, its rejection leads to obscurantism [Critchley]
	Full Idea: If what is mistaken in much contemporary philosophy is its infatuation with science, which leads to scientism, then the equally mistaken rejection of science leads to obscurantism.
	From: Simon Critchley (Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro [2001], Ch.1)
	A reaction: Clearly a balance has to be struck. I take philosophy to be a quite separate discipline from science, but it is crucial that philosophy respects the physical facts, and scientists are the experts there. Scientists are philosophers' most valued servants.

1. Philosophy / H. Continental Philosophy / 1. Continental Philosophy

7075	To meet the division in our life, try the Subject, Nature, Spirit, Will, Power, Praxis, Unconscious, or Being [Critchley]
	Full Idea: Against the Kantian division of a priori and empirical, Fichte offered activity of the subject, Schelling offered natural force, Hegel offered Spirit, Schopenhauer the Will, Nietzsche power, Marx praxis, Freud the unconscious, and Heidegger offered Being.
	From: Simon Critchley (Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro [2001])
	A reaction: The whole of Continental Philosophy summarised in a sentence. Fichte and Schopenhauer seem to point to existentialism, Schelling gives evolutionary teleology, Marx abandons philosophy, the others are up the creek.

7069	The French keep returning, to Hegel or Nietzsche or Marx [Critchley]
	Full Idea: French philosophy since the 1930s might be described as a series of returns: to Hegel (in Kojève and early Sartre), to Nietzsche (in Foucault and Deleuze), or to Marx (in Althusser).
	From: Simon Critchley (Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro [2001], Ch.2)
	A reaction: An interesting map. The question might be why they return to those three, rather than (say) Hume or Leibniz. If the choice of which one you return to a matter of 'taste' (as Nietzsche would have it)?

21. Aesthetics / B. Nature of Art / 4. Art as Expression

12165	Romantics say music expresses ideas, or the Will, or intuitions, or feelings [Scruton]
	Full Idea: According to the Romantic theory music was an expression of something, of an idea (Hegel), of the Will (Schopenhauer), of 'intuitions' (Croce), or of feelings (Collingwood).
	From: Roger Scruton (The Nature of Musical Expression [1981], p.54)
	A reaction: Deryck Cooke was the culmination of music as expression of feeling, and Stravinsky was the greatest rebel against the whole idea of expression in music. You can set out to create interesting music which does or does not grab the emotions.

21. Aesthetics / C. Artistic Issues / 4. Emotion in Art

12164	Expressing melancholy is a good thing, but arousing it is a bad thing [Scruton]
	Full Idea: To describe a piece of music as expressive of melancholy is to give a reason for listening to it; to describe it as arousing or evoking melancholy is to give a reason for avoiding it.
	From: Roger Scruton (The Nature of Musical Expression [1981], p.49)
	A reaction: Expressing sexual desire, while avoiding arousing it, is the nice challenge for a particular type of art. Would Scruton say that expressing joy is a good thing, but arousing it is bad? It is a nice observation, though.

22. Metaethics / B. Value / 1. Nature of Value / f. Ultimate value

7067	Food first, then ethics [Critchley]
	Full Idea: Food first, then ethics.
	From: Simon Critchley (Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro [2001], 8857)
	A reaction: This is not a dismissal of philosophy, but a key fact which ethical philosophers must face up to. See Mr Doolittle's speech in Shaw's 'Pygmalion. It connects to the debate c.1610 about whether one is entitled to grab someone's plank to avoid drowning.

26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 11. Against Laws of Nature

15877	The aim of science is just to create a comprehensive, elegant language to describe brute facts [Poincaré, by Harré]
	Full Idea: In Poincaré's view, we try to construct a language within which the brute facts of experience are expressed as comprehensively and as elegantly as possible. The job of science is the forging of a language precisely suited to that purpose.
	From: report of Henri Poincaré (The Value of Science [1906], Pt III) by Rom Harré - Laws of Nature 2
	A reaction: I'm often struck by how obscure and difficult our accounts of self-evident facts can be. Chairs are easy, and the metaphysics of chairs is hideous. Why is that? I'm a robust realist, but I like Poincaré's idea. He permits facts.