156 ideas
| 19807 | Both nature and reason require that everything has a cause [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Under the law of reason nothing takes place without a cause, any more than under the law of nature. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.04) | |
| A reaction: Is this the influence of Leibniz? Note that the principle is identified in two different areas, so in nature we may say 'everything has a cause', and in rationality we may say 'there is a reason for everything'. But are these the same? |
| 21267 | Supposing many principles is superfluous if a few will do it [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: It is superfluous to suppose that what can be accounted for by a few principles has been produced by many. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia,Q02,Art3,Ob2) | |
| A reaction: Notice that this is 'superfluous' rather than 'wrong'. But ten people can lift a piano which could have been lifted by eight. Note that this is 150 years before Ockham. |
| 23176 | Truth is universal, but knowledge of it is not [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: The truth is the same for all, but is not equally known to all. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], I-II Q94 4) | |
| A reaction: Amazing how many modern thinkers fail to grasp this simple distinction. However, the truth is not quite the same for all if diverse persons are expressing a single truth with different concepts and languages. The word 'facts' is helpful here. |
| 20621 | Types of lying: Speak lies, intend lies, intend deception, aim at deceptive goal? [Aquinas, by Tuckness/Wolf] |
| Full Idea: Lying can involve (1) speaking false words, (2) the intention to speak false words, (3) the intention of bringing about deception, and (4) the ultimate goal of one's deception. | |
| From: report of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Q110) by Tuckness,A/Wolf,C - This is Political Philosophy 10 'Lying' | |
| A reaction: It's a start, but much more is needed to clarify lying. Irony is an obvious problem with (1). |
| 21248 | If the existence of truth is denied, the 'Truth does not exist' must be true! [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Whoever denies the existence of truth grants that truth does not exist: and if truth does not exist, then the proposition 'Truth does not exist' is true: and if there is anything true, there must be truth. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Art 1, Obj 3) | |
| A reaction: A classic example of turning the tables, also applicable to anyone who firmly denies knowledge, or that words are meaningful, or says that meaning needs verification. However, one measily truth is not much consolation. |
| 23173 | If a syllogism admits one absurdity, others must follow [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: In syllogistic arguments, granted one absurdity, others must follow too. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], I-II Q19 6) | |
| A reaction: This asserts the necessity of logical consequence, which he derives from Aristotle. |
| 15812 | Being implies distinctness, which implies division, unity, and multitude [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: What first comes to mind is being; secondly, that this being is not that being, and thus we apprehend division as a consequence; thirdly, comes the notion of one; fourthly the notion of multitude. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], I Q11 ar2 ad4), quoted by Roderick Chisholm - Person and Object 1.5 | |
| A reaction: This is one of the best things I have read on 'being'. It is the Aristotelian recognition that we can only study being by studying identity, and that this leads on to wider metaphysics. Other approaches to being are dead ends. |
| 21268 | Non-human things are explicable naturally, and voluntary things by the will, so God is not needed [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: All natural things can be reduced to one principle, which is nature; and all voluntary things can be reduced to one principle, which is human reason, or will. Therefore God does not exist. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia,Q02,Art3,Ob2) | |
| A reaction: Not, of course, the opinion of Aquinas. So the possibility of naturalism (assuming the human will can be further reduced to nature) was a clear option in the thirteenth century. In reply Aquinas cites his Fifth Way. |
| 16765 | Humans only have a single substantial form, which contains the others and acts for them [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: A human being has no substantial form other than the intellective soul alone, and it contains the sensitive and nutritive souls, and all lower forms, and it alone brings about whatever it is that less perfect forms bring about in other things. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia Q76 4c), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 25.1 | |
| A reaction: He says brutes and plants also have a single soul. Pasnau says this is Aquinas's most distinctive doctrine, because other thinkers postulate a whole hierarchy of substantial forms. |
| 23175 | The conclusions of speculative reason about necessities are certain [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Since the speculative reason is concerned chiefly with necessary things, which cannot be otherwise than they are, its proper conclusions, like the universal principles, contain the truth without fail. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], I-II Q94 4) | |
| A reaction: This seems over-confident, and to confuse the facts with our knowledge of the facts. Simple arithmetic may seem certain, but long and intricate proofs are always a little uncertain. |
| 21337 | A knowing being possesses a further reality, the 'presence' of the thing known [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Knowing beings are differentiated from non-knowing beings by this: non-knowing beings have only their own reality, but knowing beings are capable of possessing also the reality of something else, ...a presence of the thing known produced by this thing. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia,q.Q14,art 1) | |
| A reaction: [Quoted by Ryan Meade in a talk at Pigotts] A famous and much discussed remark. Aquinas was a direct realist about perception, so this presence seems to be the thing itself, rather than a 'representation'. |
| 21249 | Some things are self-evident to us; others are only self-evident in themselves [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: A thing can be self-evident in either of two ways: on the one hand, self-evident in itself, though not to us; on the other hand, self-evident in itself, and to us. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Art 1, Obj 3) | |
| A reaction: A clear distinction, which is hard to deny, though there are lots of borderline cases. Self-evident to genius, and self-evident to future genius. Self-evident to almost everyone. Goldbach's Conjecture may be self-evident but unknowable. |
| 21250 | A proposition is self-evident if the predicate is included in the essence of the subject [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: A proposition is self-evident because the predicate is included in the essence of the subject. E.g. Man is an animal, because animal is included in the essence of man. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Art 1, Obj 3) | |
| A reaction: Aquinas focuses on the essence of the subject, where Kant embraces the whole concept of the subject. Is it self-evident that we are genetically related to apes? Yes, to a geneticiist. Is that part of human essence? No. So Kant wins. |
| 20224 | Sensation prepares the way for intellectual knowledge, which needs the virtues of reason [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Knowledge of truth is not consummated in the sensitive powers of apprehension, for these prepare the way to intellectual knowledge. And therefore in these powers there are none of the virtues by which we know truth; these are in the intellect or reason. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], I-II Q56 a5 obj3), quoted by Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski - Virtues of the Mind III 2.2 | |
| A reaction: A gem of a quotation for Zagzebski's thesis, that knowledge is defined in terms of the intellectual virtues. The only virtues of perception are in focusing and paying attention to features. Good eyesight is a biological 'virtue', I suppose. |
| 22107 | Sensations are transmitted to 'internal senses' in the brain, chiefly to 'phantasia' and 'imagination' [Aquinas, by Kretzmann/Stump] |
| Full Idea: Sensory species received in external senses are transmitted to 'internal senses', organs located in the brain. The most important of these for cognition are 'phantasia' and 'imagination' (part of phantasia), which produce and preserve 'phantasms'. | |
| From: report of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265]) by Kretzmann/Stump - Aquinas, Thomas 11 | |
| A reaction: This seems to make Aquinas a representative realist. I add this to my portfolio of philosophical faculties - those required by philosophy, rather than by psychology or neuroscience. |
| 9098 | Mental activity combines what we sense with imagination of what is not present [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Mental activity combines two activities which in the senses are distinct: exterior perception in which we are simply affected by what we sense, and interior imagination in which we create images of things that are not, and never have been present. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ch.5 Q85.2) | |
| A reaction: Geach cites this thought to show that he is anti-abstractionist, since mind creates images, and these can arise from things which have not been experienced. Any defence of abstractionism must allow an active power to imagination. |
| 9092 | Abstracting A from B generates truth, as long as the connection is not denied [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Abstacting A from B can mean denying A's connection with B, or simply thinking A without thinking B. Abstracting what in reality is connected generates falsehood if done the first way, but not if done the second. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ch.5 Q85.1) | |
| A reaction: Despite Geach's denials, this seems to make Aquinas a classic abstractionist. He goes on to distinguish two sorts of abstraction, but he certainly thinks of abstraction from sense experience as a revelation about the nature of reality. |
| 9093 | We understand the general nature of things by ignoring individual peculiarities [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: If we think what defines a stone, man or horse, without thinking of any individual peculiarities it may have, this is precisely what we do when we abstract the general nature of what we understand from any particular way in which we imagine it. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ch.5 Q85.1) | |
| A reaction: This may not be simple abstraction from sense experience, since there would obviously be a threatened circularity in the process. Do you need to know the essential definition first, in order to discard the individual peculiarities? |
| 9097 | The mind abstracts generalities from images, but also uses images for understanding [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Our mind both abstracts the species from images when it attends to the general nature of things, and understand the species in the images when it has recourse to the images in order to understand the things whose species it has abstracted. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ch.5 Q85.1) | |
| A reaction: Geach claims that the second half of this idea means that Aquinas is not an abstractionist, but he seems to be explictly abstractionist about the way in which we create higher level concepts from lower ones. |
| 9095 | Very general ideas (being, oneness, potentiality) can be abstracted from thought matter in general [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: There are even things we can abstract from thought matter in general, things like being and oneness and potentiality and realization. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ch.5 Q85.1) | |
| A reaction: The Aristotelian 'potentiality' means possibility, which means that modality is understood by abstraction. Aquinas seems to have four levels: particular perceived, general perceived, particular thought, and general thought. This is the highest level. |
| 9099 | Particular instances come first, and (pace Plato) generalisations are abstracted from them [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: The generality attaching to a nature - its relatedness to many particular instances - results from abstraction, so in this sense a generalized nature presupposes its instances, and does not, as Plato thought, precede them. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ch.5 Q85.2) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be a quite explicit endorsement of abstractionism by Aquinas, despite all Geach's assertions to the contrary. |
| 10508 | Species are abstracted from appearances by ignoring individual conditions [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: The agent intellect abstracts intelligible species from phantasms insofar as through the power of the agent intellect we can take into our consideration the natures of the species without the individual conditions. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Q85 Ad4) | |
| A reaction: There might be a threatened circularity here, in trying to decide which features to ignore and which to retain. If we saw a hundred horses with a white nose blaze, we still wouldn't be sure that this was essential to a horse. Innate notions of species?? |
| 22111 | Aquinas attributes freedom to decisions and judgements, and not to the will alone [Aquinas, by Kretzmann/Stump] |
| Full Idea: Aquinas conceives of freedom as free decision or judgement, which cannot be attributed to the will alone. | |
| From: report of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265]) by Kretzmann/Stump - Aquinas, Thomas 12 | |
| A reaction: This idea might improve the free will debate considerably, because it is not clear what sort of thing a 'will' is, and it is not clear how an entity can be 'free' in isolation, by its intrinsic nature. Isn't all freedom contextual? |
| 22105 | The human intellectual soul is an incorporeal, subsistent principle [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: It is necessary to say that that which is the principle of intellective activity, what we call the soul of a human being, is an incorporeal, subsistent principle. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia.Q75 2c), quoted by Kretzmann/Stump - Aquinas, Thomas 10 | |
| A reaction: Note 'subsistent' rather than 'existent' (capable of independence?). This identifies the immortal soul with the conscious mind. 'Principle' is an odd word, presumably with roots in Aristotle. It seems to be an Aristotelian 'form' [morphe]. |
| 22108 | First grasp what it is, then its essential features; judgement is their compounding and division [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: The intellect first apprehends the quiddity of a thing. ...Then it acquires the properties, accidents and dispositions associated with the thing's essence. It must proceed from one compounding or dividing of aspects to another, which is reasoning. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia.Q85 5c), quoted by Kretzmann/Stump - Aquinas, Thomas 11 | |
| A reaction: [compressed] Tracking the process of acquiring knowledge of a thing (rather than necessary and sufficient conditions for full knowledge) is closer to Quine's naturalised epistemology than to the standard analytic approach to the concept of knowledge. |
| 10503 | We abstract forms from appearances, and acquire knowledge of immaterial things [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: To cognize that which is in individual matter, not as it is in such matter, is to abstract the form from the individual matter that the phantasms represents. Thus we come to a degree of cognition of immaterial things. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Q85 1 Reply) | |
| A reaction: This offers abstraction as a kind of inference to best explanation which takes us beyond immediate empirical experience to what is behind it. Aquinas thinks the concepts and explanation are spiritual, but they may be generalities and essences. |
| 10509 | Understanding consists entirely of grasping abstracted species [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Of the thing understood all that is within the actually understanding intellect is the abstracted intelligible species. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Q85 Art2) | |
| A reaction: Abstraction is never supposed to be a luxury bolt-on, but is always seen (in this tradition, and presumably in the modern one), as essential to the intellect, and its way of coming to understand the world. Aristotelian definition is behind this idea. |
| 10506 | Mathematics can be abstracted from sensible matter, and from individual intelligible matter [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Intellect can abstract mathematical species from sensible matter, both individual and common. Yet it cannot abstract such species from common intelligible matter, but only from individual intelligible matter. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Q85 Ad2) | |
| A reaction: The idea is that common intelligible matter lacks underlying substance, which is where quantity is to be found. |
| 9094 | Mathematical objects abstract both from perceived matter, and from particular substance [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Objects of mathematics abstract from perceived matter both in particular and in general, though from thought matter (substance as underlying quality) only in particular and not in general. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ch.5 Q85.1) | |
| A reaction: This appears to be a thoroughly abstractionist view of the way in which humans create mathematics. Aquinas explicitly denies the Platonic view that the numbers already have abstract existence, awaiting our discovery. |
| 10505 | We can just think of an apple's colour, because the apple is not part of the colour's nature [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: The apple is not part of the nature of the colour, and so nothing prevents one from understanding the colour while understanding nothing of the apple. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Q85 1 Ad 1) | |
| A reaction: This helps to clarify why the procedure of 'ignoring' features is possible. It suggests that some features might be too entangled with the substance (too essential?) to be thus ignored. I can't think of an example, though. Why not?! |
| 10504 | Abstracting either treats something as separate, or thinks of it separately [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Abstracting takes place in two ways: by composition and division, understanding something to be not in another or to be separated from it; and by a simple and unconditioned consideration, understanding one thing while not considering the other at all. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Q85 1 Ad 1) | |
| A reaction: The second way is by 'ignoring', which he says cannot contain error. The first seems to be considering some mode of a thing to be actually separate from the thing, which could clearly be erroneous. Ignoring makes to commitment to a unity. |
| 10507 | Numbers and shapes are abstracted by ignoring their sensible qualities [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Quantities such as numbers and dimensions, and also shapes (which are the limits of quantities) can be considered without their sensible qualities, which is for them to be abstracted from sensible matter. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Q85 Ad2) | |
| A reaction: His account relies on underlying substance, which is where quantity is to be found (presumably because a substance is the epitome of a unit). |
| 9096 | The mind must produce by its own power an image of the individual species [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: The agent mind must itself turn to images, and produce by its own power in the receptive mind a representation as to species of whatever the images represent as individual. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ch.5 Q85.1) | |
| A reaction: Unlike much of this section, this sentence supports Geach's claim that Aquinas agrees with him - that the mind creates its concepts, rather than 'abstracting' them from experience. |
| 23180 | The will is the rational appetite [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: The will is the rational appetite. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], II-II Q58 4) | |
| A reaction: Defining the will in terms of reason sounds more like an Enlightenment optimist than a medieval theologian. I suspect that for him it is tautological the reason is involved, if only the reason can make decisions. Hobbes prefers to ruling appetite. |
| 7404 | Nations are not obliged to help one-another, but are obliged not to harm one another [Grotius, by Tuck] |
| Full Idea: Grotius explored the implications of the idea that nation-states were under no obligation to help one another, but they were obliged not to harm each other. | |
| From: report of Hugo Grotius (On the Law of War and Peace [1625]) by Richard Tuck - Hobbes Ch.1 | |
| A reaction: This is quite a striking disanalogy between accepted personal morality and political morality. There are signs in recent years of some recognition that other nations should not just sit and watch suffering. |
| 7235 | Without freedom of will actions lack moral significance [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: If you take away all freedom of the will, you strip a man's actions of all moral significance. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.4) | |
| A reaction: Rousseau is (in the context) guilty of the basic error of confusing freedom of action with freedom of the will. If the will has scope to act, it has freedom of action; if the will is not contrained in its decision by prior causes, it has freedom of will. |
| 22112 | For humans good is accordance with reason, and bad is contrary to reason [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: A human being's good is existing in accordance with reason, while what is bad for a human being is whatever is contrary to reason. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia IIae.Q18.5c), quoted by Kretzmann/Stump - Aquinas, Thomas 13 | |
| A reaction: For anyone who thought Kant invented the idea that morality derives from reason. This idea of Aquinas is a fairly precise echo of the stoic view (which influenced Kant). Is there a circularity? Is it irrational because bad, or bad because irrational? |
| 22494 | We must know the end, know that it is the end, and know how to attain it [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Perfect knowledge of the end consists in not only apprehending the thing which is the end but also knowing it under the aspect of the end and the relation of the means to that end. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], II-I.Q132), quoted by Philippa Foot - Natural Goodness 4 | |
| A reaction: We don't talk much now about 'perfect' knowledge of something, but I suppose this is the necessary and sufficient conditions. If you complete the checklist, your knowledge should be perfect (if the list is right). |
| 23181 | All acts of virtue relate to justice, which is directed towards the common good [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: The good of any virtue …is referable to the common good, to which justice directs, so that all acts of virtue can pertain to justice insofar as it directs man to the common good. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], II-II Q58 5) | |
| A reaction: Michael Sandel has recently lamented to fading of the concept of 'the common good' from our moral and political life. In which case this thought of Aquinas takes on great importance. I certainly like it. It seems to apply to courage, for example. |
| 8009 | Aquinas wanted, not to escape desire, but to transform it for moral ends [Aquinas, by MacIntyre] |
| Full Idea: The Aristotelianism of Thomas Aquinas (unlike St Augustine's Platonism) is not concerned with escaping from the snares of the world and of desire, but with transforming desire for moral ends. | |
| From: report of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265]) by Alasdair MacIntyre - A Short History of Ethics Ch.9 | |
| A reaction: This is very close to Aristotle himself, for whom education of the feelings (into good habits, and then true virtues) was central. Education of feelings should be central to all education (though young psychopaths may show resistance). |
| 23182 | Legal justice is supreme, because it directs the other virtues to the common good [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: There must be one supreme virtue essentially distinct from every other virtue, which directs all the virtues to the common good, and this virtue is legal justice. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], II-II Q58 6) | |
| A reaction: This concept of legal justice is underpinned, for Aquinas, by the concept of natural law, which has divine backing. Positive law could hardly fulfil such a major role, given that it could be corrupt. |
| 22399 | Temperance prevents our passions from acting against reason [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: The passions may incite us to something against reason, and so we need a curb, which we name 'temperance'. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia 2ae Q61 a.3), quoted by Philippa Foot - Virtues and Vices II | |
| A reaction: I am increasingly unclear what 'reason' means in contexts like these. It seems to mean no more than the awareness of greater goods than the indulgence of passion. Without that awareness, high intelligence couldn't produce temperance. |
| 23177 | Justice directs our relations with others, because it denotes a kind of equality [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: It is proper to justice, as compared with the other virtues, to direct man in his relations with others, because it denotes a kind of equality, as its very name implies; indeed we are wont to say that things are 'adjusted' when they are made equal. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], II-II Q57 1) | |
| A reaction: Even if you say justice is giving people what they deserve, rather than mere equality, they must still be equal in receiving like for like. Legal justice implies equality before the law (except for monarchs?). |
| 19791 | Natural mankind is too fragmented for states of peace, or of war and enmity [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Men are not naturally enemies, for the simple reason that men living in their original state of independence do not have sufficiently constant relationships among themselves to bring about either a state of peace or a state of war. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.4) | |
| A reaction: He sees people in a state of nature as more or less solitary, and certainly in groups any more organised than a small family. One might then be in a state of permanent feud, rather than war, but without settlements people can move away. |
| 20501 | Rousseau assumes that laws need a people united by custom and tradition [Rousseau, by Wolff,J] |
| Full Idea: Rousseau assumes that there should already be bonds of custom and tradition uniting a people before it is fit to receive laws. | |
| From: report of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762]) by Jonathan Wolff - An Introduction to Political Philosophy (Rev) 3 'Rousseau' | |
| A reaction: In unusual circumstances, such as the arrival of a large population at a new colony, it might be that the laws would create the missing customs and traditions. |
| 7237 | The act of becoming 'a people' is the real foundation of society [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The act by which people become 'a people' is the real foundation of society. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.5) | |
| A reaction: The difficulty with many older countries is that it is impossible to identify such an act. Mythologies are created to fictionalise such acts; in Britain we refer back to King Alfred, and to Magna Carta. I suspect 1660 is the key year. |
| 19792 | To overcome obstacles, people must unite their forces into a single unified power [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Men have no other means of maintaining themselves but to form by aggregation a sum of forces that could gain the upper hand over the resistance of obstacles, so that their forces are directed by means of a single moving power and made to act in concert. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.6) | |
| A reaction: I prefer the Aristotelian view, that men are naturally gregarious and social (like bees and ants), so this act of solidarity in superfluous. A human people is only broken up by violence or disaster, like kicking over an ants' nest. |
| 19812 | Human nature changes among a people, into a moral and partial existence [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The establisher of a people is in a position to change human nature, to transform each individual into a part of a larger whole from which the individual receives his life and being, to substitute a partial and moral existence for natural independence. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.07) | |
| A reaction: The 'partial' part is obvious, in the compromises of society, but he says we only become moral in a people, and even more so when that people constitute a state. In the state of nature, morality seems to be unneeded, rather than absent. |
| 19814 | A state must be big enough to preserve itself, but small enough to be governable [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Like a well-formed man, there are limits to the size a state can have, so as not to be too large to be capable of being well governed, nor too small to be capable of preserving itself on its own. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.09) | |
| A reaction: Geneva was his model, and it is close to the size of a Greek polis. Presumably even Scotland would be thought ungovernable, never mind the United States. Luxembourg might be his ideal nowadays. Thousands of them! |
| 19815 | Too much land is a struggle, producing defensive war; too little makes dependence, and offensive war [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Too much land makes its defence is onerous, its cultivation inadequate, and its yield surplus, which causes defensive wars. If there is not enough land, the state is at the discretion of its neighbours for what it needs as surplus, causing offensive wars. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.10) | |
| A reaction: This sounds much too simplistic, like the causes of squabbles in a kindergarten. Certainly inequalities between nations (such as the USA and Mexico) produces frictions. Advances in agriculture technology have transformed this problem. |
| 19822 | If the state enlarges, the creators of the general will become less individually powerful [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The ratio of the sovereign to the subject increases in proportion to the number of citizens. The larger the state becomes, the less liberty there is. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.01) | |
| A reaction: This is because we remain equally subjected to the state whatever its size, but have less power to influence if there are more citizens. In modern states we all feel pathetically powerless, because of the numbers. |
| 19823 | If the population is larger, the government needs to be more powerful [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: In order to be good, the government must be relatively stronger in proportion as the populace is more numerous. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.01) | |
| A reaction: This could either imply a larger government, or more powerful laws for a fairly small government. Rousseau implies an almost mathematical law (of ratios) which determines the size of the government. |
| 7232 | Man is born free, and he is everywhere in chains [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Man is born free, and he is everywhere in chains. Those who think themselves the masters of others are indeed greater slaves than they. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.1) | |
| A reaction: I've always liked the second sentence, though it may be wishful thinking. It is probably rather fun owning slaves. The idea that man is 'born free' strikes me as nonsense. Man is a highly social animal, which only flourishes if enmeshed in a culture. |
| 7234 | No man has any natural authority over his fellows [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: No man has any natural authority over his fellows. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.4) | |
| A reaction: This is, of course, specifically denying that superior strength is the same as a natural right. 'Right' might be a better word than 'authority'. If strength doesn't bestow a natural right, then presumably neither does weakness. |
| 7402 | Everyone has a right of self-preservation, and harming others is usually unjustifiable [Grotius, by Tuck] |
| Full Idea: Grotius said that all men would agree that everyone has a fundamental right to preserve themselves, and that wanton or unnecessary injury to another person is unjustifiable. | |
| From: report of Hugo Grotius (On the Law of War and Peace [1625]) by Richard Tuck - Hobbes Ch.1 | |
| A reaction: Who cares if it is 'justifiable'? Do I have to 'justify' killing a mosquito if it lands on my arm? Grotius is taking a step beyond saying that people should defend themselves, to say that they have a 'right' to - the only truly basic right. |
| 19816 | A state's purpose is liberty and equality - liberty for strength, and equality for liberty [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The greatest good and purpose of every legislative system boils down to liberty and equality. Liberty because dependence takes force from the body of the state, and equality because liberty cannot subsist without it. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.11) | |
| A reaction: The idea of 'taking force' seems to cover the modern welfare state. Rousseau likes robustly self-sufficient citizens. To ensure equality, however, it may be necessary to restrict liberty. |
| 7247 | The greatest social good comes down to freedom and equality [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The greatest good of all, which ought to be the goal of every system of law, comes down to two main objects, freedom and equality. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.11) | |
| A reaction: He goes on the specify the nature of the equality (Idea 7248). A rival pair of goods might be security and opportunity. On balance, I think I prefer my pair to Rousseau's. |
| 19838 | The measure of a successful state is increase in its population [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The government under which, without external means, without naturalisations, without colonies, the citizens become populous and multiply the most, is infallibly the best government. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.09) | |
| A reaction: I'm not sure if this was true in the eighteenth century. Birth control has entirely changed the picture, since affluent people seem less inclined to breed. Presumably poverty increased famine and infant mortality. |
| 19848 | The sovereignty does not appoint the leaders [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The election of leaders is a function of government and not of the sovereignty. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.3) | |
| A reaction: The point is that the general will only establishes the form of government, and not its content. In Britain we accept leaders who are appointed by their own party, and not by the electorate. |
| 20567 | Rousseau insists that popular sovereignty needs a means of expressing consent [Rousseau, by Oksala] |
| Full Idea: Rousseau's idea of popular sovereignty is a much more radical idea of self-government, because he insists that the consent of the people has to have a real means of expression. | |
| From: report of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762]) by Johanna Oksala - Political Philosophy: all that matters Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: Presumably Hobbes's 'contract' is forgotten in the mists of time, and ceases to be of any interest to a ruler (such as Charles I, who thought God must have appointed him). Perhaps Britain needs an annual ceremony reaffirming the monarch. |
| 19801 | Sovereignty is the exercise of the general will, which can never be delegated [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Since sovereignty is merely the exercise of the general will, it can never be alienated, and the sovereign which is only a collective being, cannot be represented by anything but itself. Power can perfectly well be transmitted, but not the will. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.01) | |
| A reaction: Part of the post-Hobbesian revolution, which sees sovereignty as residing in the will or consensus of the people, rather than in a divine right, or a right of power. In 2016 this isn't going very well. A people choosing to obey is thereby dissolved. |
| 19805 | Just as people control their limbs, the general-will state has total control of its members [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Just as nature gives each man an absolute power over all of his members, the social compact gives the body politic an absolute over all its members, which is the power directed by the general will, and bearing the name sovereignty. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.04) | |
| A reaction: A highly organic view of the state, and his favourite political metaphor. Does the metaphor include disease and madness? In the 1930s Germany went insane. The man may be happy, but are his limbs happy? If I burn my hand? Etc. |
| 19818 | Political laws are fundamental, as they firmly organise the state - but they could still be changed [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The laws regulating the relationship of the sovereign to the state are political laws, which are also fundamental. There is one way of organising a state, and people should stand by it. ...But a people is always in a position to change its laws. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.12) | |
| A reaction: Constitutions take on a sacred and inviolable quality, but Rousseau clearly thinks 'the Sabbath is made for man'. I think the USA is crazy not to change its constitution on the subject of bearing arms. |
| 19790 | Force can only dominate if it is seen as a right, and obedience as a duty [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The strongest is never strong enough to be master all the time, unless he transforms force into right and obedience into duty. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.3) | |
| A reaction: Presumably the people only accept force as a right and obedience as a duty if they appear to be in the people's interests - because the alternative looks worse. In other words, they are terrified. |
| 7233 | The social order is a sacred right, but based on covenants, not nature [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The social order is a sacred right which serves as a basis for all other rights; and as it is not a natural right, it must be one founded on covenants. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.1) | |
| A reaction: I think Rousseau is offering a contradiction here, when he suggests we have a 'sacred' right, which is nevertheless only based on 'covenants'. You can't have it both ways. This is an abuse of the word 'sacred'. |
| 19842 | The government is instituted by a law, not by a contract [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The act that institutes the government is not a contract but a law. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.18) | |
| A reaction: This is a law which implements the general will. There is nothing for citizens to make a contract with, since the sovereign is an abstraction, whereas a social contract is made between actual people. I like Rousseau's big idea. |
| 7239 | The social pact is the total subjection of individuals to the general will [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The essence of the social pact is that 'each one of us puts into the community his person and all his powers under the supreme direction of the general will; and as a body, we incorporate every member as an indivisible part of the whole'. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.6) | |
| A reaction: This is alarmingly like totally subjecting yourself to the 'Will of God', where the big problem is a bunch of priests (or worse) insisting that they know better than you do what that Will consists of. I have no idea what the current Will of Britain is. |
| 19793 | We need a protective association which unites forces, but retains individual freedom [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The problem is to find a form of association which protects with all common forces the person and goods of each associate, by means of which each one, while uniting with all, nevertheless obeys only himself and remains as free as before. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.6) | |
| A reaction: This is the clear purpose of Rousseau's famous concept of the General Will. The idea is that you submit to the general will because you helped formulate it, so you remain free. It is a lovely idea, but notoriously difficult to implement. |
| 7240 | To foreign powers a state is seen as a simple individual [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: In relation to a foreign power, the body politic is a simple entity, an individual. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.7) | |
| A reaction: This is strikingly contrary to the spirit of liberalism, in which I may be appalled by the foreign policy of my own government, and protest strongly against it. Rousseau might be considered as freedom's greatest champion, and greatest enemy! |
| 19795 | The act of association commits citizens to the state, and the state to its citizens [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The act of association is a reciprocal commitment of public and private individuals, and each individual, contracting with himself, is under a twofold commitment, as a member of the sovereign to individuals, and as a member of the state to the sovereign. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.7) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be expressed in modern terms as a mutual entailment of rights and duties. Where the traditional social contract is just between individuals, this seems to be a contract with a unified abstraction, of state commitment to citizens. |
| 19797 | Citizens must ultimately for forced to accept the general will (so freedom is compulsory!) [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: To avoid the general compact being an empty formula, it tacitly entails the commitment that whoever refuses to obey the general will will be forced to do so by the entire body. This means merely that he will be forced to be free. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.7) | |
| A reaction: Rousseau obviously enjoyed this paradox (which sounds like US foreign policy). Apart from anarchism, any political system will need a bit of force to back it up. Should democratic voting becoming compulsory, if the turnout declines too far? |
| 19796 | Individual citizens still retain a private will, which may be contrary to the general will [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Each individual can, as a man, have a private will contrary to or different from the general will that he has as a citizen. His private interest can speak to him in an entirely different manner than the common interest. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.7) | |
| A reaction: So why I accept the general will when these two clash (apart from threat of punishment - which may be capital if I am recalcitrant!)? Usually the general will is also for my good - but not always. Idealist love of the people? |
| 7244 | The general will is common interest; the will of all is the sum of individual desires [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The general will studies only common interest, while the will of all studies private interest, and is indeed no more than the sum of individual desires. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.03) | |
| A reaction: This invites the obvious liberal response (given later by utilitarians: Idea 3778) that there can be no more to any great 'will' than the sum of the individuals (which leads to Margaret Thatcher's famous 'there is no such thing as society'). |
| 19802 | The general will is always right, but the will of all can err, because it includes private interests [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The general will is always right. ....There is often a great deal of difference between the will of all and the general will. The latter considers only the general interest, but the former considers private interest and is merely the sum of private wills. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.03) | |
| A reaction: Hence in order to get an expression of the general will, voters must exclusively focus on the general good. I do that in general elections, only to find that the people around me vote for their own interests. I wish we all did the same thing. |
| 19803 | If the state contains associations there are fewer opinions, undermining the general will [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: If there are partial association in the state ...there are no longer as many voters as there are men, but merely as many as there are associations. The differences become less numerous and yield a result that is less general. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.03) | |
| A reaction: This appears to entirely reject political parties, and similar groups, which he had seen forming in England. It goes with his interesting faith that the more separate views there are, the more the right choice will emerge. |
| 19804 | If a large knowledgeable population votes in isolation, their many choices will have good results [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: If, when a sufficiently informed populace deliberates, the citizens were to have no communication among themselves, the general will would always result from a large number of small differences, and the deliberations would always be good. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.03) | |
| A reaction: An obvious weak point in the electorate being well informed, if someone controls the sources of information. All the optimism of the Enlightenment is in this idea - that rational beings converge of the truth. All pubs closed in the month of an election? |
| 19808 | The general will changes its nature when it focuses on particulars [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Just as a private will cannot represent the general will, the general will, for its part, alters its nature when it has a particular object. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.04) | |
| A reaction: Is the general will, then, in danger of being much too general, because as soon as it gets close to anything practical it becomes distorted. It can design the constitution, but can it give a view on capital punishment, or is that too personal? |
| 7246 | The general will is always good, but sometimes misunderstood [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: By themselves the people always will what is good, but by themselves they do not always discern it. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.06) | |
| A reaction: This sounds like a can of worms. It invites someone to step in as interpreter - a spin doctor, perhaps, or a newspaper proprietor. The first proposition strikes me as absurdly optimistic. Think of the people of Europe in August 1914. |
| 7250 | Laws are authentic acts of the general will [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The laws are nothing other than the authentic acts of the general will. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.12) | |
| A reaction: I wonder how you tell whether an act of the general will is 'authentic'? Nevertheless, in a modern democracy there seems a lot of truth in it; when controversial legislation is in the offing, governments have to be very attentive to the people. |
| 19844 | Assemblies must always confirm the form of government, and the current administration [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The opening of assemblies, which solely aim to preserve the social treaty, should always start with two separate propositions: 1) does it please the sovereign to preserve the present form of government?, 2) ...and to preserve the present administration? | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.18) | |
| A reaction: I would love it if the British people were allowed to discuss our form of government, but it now seems completely ossified. Being a monarchy, with the consequent patronage, almost guarantees this stasis. |
| 19846 | The more unanimous the assembly, the stronger the general will becomes [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The more harmony reigns in the assemblies, that is to say, the closer opinions come to unanimity, the more dominant too is the general will. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.2) | |
| A reaction: This seems important, because the general will comes in degrees. A decision from the assembly would come with an index number indicating its strength. His dream is obviously to get close to unanimity on all decisions. Maybe! Brexit 52%! |
| 19817 | Citizens should be independent of each other, and very dependent on the state [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Each citizen should be perfectly independent of all the others and excessively dependent on the city. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.12) | |
| A reaction: Unlike many other of his pronouncements, this sounds a bit like a welfare state, though I doubt if he means that. Rousseau's state, founded by the general will, seems to have a quasi-religious quality, like a devotee's love of God. |
| 19840 | A citizen is a subject who is also sovereign [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The words 'subject' and 'sovereign' are identical correlatives, whose meaning is combined in the single word 'citizen'. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.13) | |
| A reaction: 'Citizen' was the favourite post-revolutionary label, probably based on this remark. I've heard foreigners tease Britons for being 'subjects' of the monarch, where they are pure citizens. But we are all subject to the law, made by others. |
| 19839 | The flourishing of arts and letters is too much admired [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Times in which letters and arts are known to have flourished have been admired too much. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.09 n9) | |
| A reaction: I assume most marxists would agree with this thought. Eighteenth century France is a good candidate for this judgement. The arts always needed patronage. |
| 19798 | Ancient monarchs were kings of peoples; modern monarchs more cleverly rule a land [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Ancient monarchs called themselves King of the Persians or Scythians, regarding themselve merely as the leaders of men. Today's monarchs more shrewdly call themselves King of France or England. By holding the land, they are sure of the inhabitants. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.9) | |
| A reaction: This matches the Germans being earlier defined by speaking the language, and now defined by a territory. It is more to do with the rise of the modern state than to do with the shrewdness of the monarchs. |
| 19831 | The highest officers under a monarchy are normally useless; the public could choose much better [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Those who attain the highest positions in monarchies are most often petty bunglers, swindlers and intriguers, whose talents serve only to display their incompetence to the public. The populace is much less often in error in its choice than the prince. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
| A reaction: Many monarchs have had famously good advisers, such as Lord Burleigh. The worst thing about bad leaders, at any level, is the bad appointments they make. |
| 19833 | Hereditary monarchy is easier, but can lead to dreadful monarchs [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Some crowns are hereditary. So by substituting the disadvantage of regencies for elections, an apparent tranquillity has been preferred to a wise election, the risk of having children, monsters or imbeciles for leaders is preferred to choosing good kings. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
| A reaction: Henry VI is the prime English example. The regents feuded, and then when he grew up it became obvious that he was hopeless. How many English monarchs would have been elected? But we would have missed Good Queen Bess. |
| 19834 | Attempts to train future kings don't usually work, and the best have been unprepared [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: A great deal of effort is made to teach young princes the art of ruling. It does not appear that this education does them any good. It would be better to teach them the art of obeying. The most celebrated kings were not brought up to reign. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
| A reaction: King Alfred is our prime example of a success, But if only we had had Charles I's late brother Henry, instead the untrained Charles. |
| 19829 | Natural aristocracy is primitive, and hereditary is dreadful, but elective aristocracy is best [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: There are three sorts of aristocracy: natural, elective, and hereditary. The first is suited only to simple people; the third is the worst of any government. The second is the best; it is aristocracy properly so-called. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.05) | |
| A reaction: This seems like the modern idea of 'meritocracy'. The Chinese civil service exams, introduced into Europe in the nineteenth century. |
| 7249 | Natural aristocracy is primitive, hereditary is bad, and elective aristocracy is the best [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: There are three types of aristocracy, natural, elective and hereditary. The first is suited only to primitive peoples; the third is the worst of all governments; the second is the best, and this is aristocracy in the true sense of the word. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.05) | |
| A reaction: Presumably he means what we call 'meritocracy', and it seems a bit optimistic to hope that democracy will deliver that. I don't think Plato would expect a democracy to elect his Guardians. |
| 19830 | Large states need a nobility to fill the gap between a single prince and the people [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: With a large state in the hands of one man there is too great a distance between the prince and the people, and the state lacks cohesiveness. This requires intermediate orders of nobility to fill them. A small state is ruined by all these social levels. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] This seems to be a justification for the French ancien regime. Presumably this bit was not quoted much in 1789. Why must the gap be filled by 'nobility'? What about an elected house of lords? |
| 19827 | Law makers and law implementers should be separate [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: It is not good for the one who makes the laws to execute them. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.04) | |
| A reaction: He doesn't give his reasons here, but this piece of wisdom is widely supported. There is a problem when the executive find themselves trying to enforce bad, discredited laws. Maybe the police know best what the law should say? Or not! |
| 19820 | The state has a legislature and an executive, just like the will and physical power in a person [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Every free action has a moral cause, the will, and a physical cause, the power to act. ...The body politic has the same moving causes, namely the legislative power, and executive power. Nothing should be done without their concurrence. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.01) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] This terminology is now standard in political philosophy. An absolute monarch like Edward III presumably embodies both branches. |
| 19821 | I call the executive power the 'government', which is the 'prince' - a single person, or a group [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: I call 'government' or supreme administration the legitimate exercise of executive power; I call 'prince' or magistrate the man or body charged with that administration. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.01) | |
| A reaction: Whether the prince is one person or many is left up to the legislative body, which is the general will. Rousseau has no view on the matter. |
| 19824 | Large populations needs stronger control, which means power should be concentrated [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The government becomes slack as the magistrates are multiplied, and the more numerous the people the greater should be the increase of repressive force - ...so the number of leaders should decrease in proportion to the increase of the number of people. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.02) | |
| A reaction: This bit sounds Stalinist! A vast population seems to require a dictator. When his state is Geneva-sized Rousseau seems comfortable, but his plans for bigger states are a bit disturbing. |
| 19826 | Democracy for small states, aristocracy for intermediate, monarchy for large [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Democratic government is suited to small states, aristocratic government to states of intermediate size, and monarchical government to large ones. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.03) | |
| A reaction: Is he thinking of France for the large state? What would he have made of 1789? Does this progression go on to increase the power of the monarch as the state gets even larger, into dictatorship? |
| 19837 | If inhabitants are widely dispersed, organising a revolt is much more difficult [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The greater the area occupied by the same number of inhabitants, the more difficult it becomes to revolt, since concerted action cannot be taken promptly and secretly. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.09) | |
| A reaction: Revolutions since then have all occurred in large cities, which have become huge. The dispersal of the rest of the population (as in Russia) doesn't matter. |
| 19843 | The state is not bound to leave civil authority to its leaders [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The state is no more bound to leave civil authority to its leaders than it is to leave military authority to its generals. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.18) | |
| A reaction: He assumes that a meeting of the citizens can articulate a new expression of the general will, but this idea also endorses revolution, if the prince or magistrates refuse to call this national AGM. |
| 21938 | Democracy needs respect for individuality, but the 'community of friends' implies strict equality [Grotius] |
| Full Idea: There is no democracy without respect for irreducible singularity, but there is no democracy with the 'community of friends' without the calculation of majorities, without identifiable representable subjects, all equal. | |
| From: Hugo Grotius (On the Law of War and Peace [1625]), quoted by Simon Glendinning - Derrida: A Very Short Introduction 7 | |
| A reaction: [source not given] Derrida calls this conflict 'tragic'. The obvious reply is that equality is not an absolute. We can be equal in voting rights while being unequal in height or musical talent. |
| 19825 | If the sovereign entrusts government to at least half the citizens, that is 'democracy' [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The sovereign can entrust the government to the entire people or to the majority of them. This is given the name 'democracy'. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.03) | |
| A reaction: Note that democracy is here a form for the executive, not for the legislature. I take it that the general will must come close to unanimity, and a mere 51% support for fundamental legislation would never do. Increase the percentage with the importance? |
| 19832 | Democratic elections are dangerous intervals in government [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Elections leave dangerous intervals and are stormy. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
| A reaction: American presidential elections partially paralyse government for about nine months. In a settled democracy the process of election seems OK. The immediate aftermath can be worse. Losers may refuse to accept the result. |
| 7243 | Silence of the people implies their consent [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The silence of the people permits the assumption that the people consents. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.01) | |
| A reaction: This seems to me a crucial principle for a democracy, because it says that the democratic way of life is much more than elections. Each citizen has a duty to bravely speak out; the more citizens willing to do this, the less bravery is required. |
| 7251 | The English are actually slaves in between elections [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The English people believes itself to be free; it is gravely mistaken; it is free only during the election of Members of Parliament; as soon as the Members are elected, the people is enslaved. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.15) | |
| A reaction: Rousseau seems to be hoping for some sort of direct democracy. We could probably set up a direct democracy, by implementing regular voting over the internet, but I doubt if Rousseau would like that either. I certainly wouldn't. |
| 7238 | Minorities only accept majority-voting because of a prior unanimous agreement [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: If there were no earlier agreement, how could there be any obligation on the minority to accept the decision of the majority? The law of majority-voting rests on a covenant, implying at least one previous occasion of unanimity. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.5) | |
| A reaction: In Britain this points to the Reform Acts of 1832 onwards as crucial. However, whenever democracy is newly introduced into a country (Iraq being a current spectacular case) there is usually a minority opposed to it, who are forcibly overruled. |
| 19828 | Democracy leads to internal strife, as people struggle to maintain or change ways of ruling [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: No government is so subject to civil wars and internal agitations as a democratic or popular one, since there is none that tends so forcefully and continuously to change its form, or that demands greater vigilance and courage to keep its form. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.05) | |
| A reaction: We would like to think that a robust democracy, with a free press, can cope with all this strife and still survive. He may be thinking of the English Civil War. Democracies seem to be more conservative about the structure of government. |
| 19835 | When ministers change the state changes, because they always reverse policies [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Each revolution in the ministry produces a revolution in the state, since the maxim common to all ministers and nearly all kings is to do the reverse of their predecessor in everything. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.06) | |
| A reaction: Most parents bring up their children by trying to correct mistakes their own parents made. British democracy is rife with this desperate need for a new government to make its mark, because they want to win the next election. |
| 19849 | In early theocracies the god was the king, and there were as many gods as nations [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: At first men had no other kings but gods, and no other government than a theocratic one. ....By the mere fact that a god was placed at the head of every political society, it followed that there were as many gods as there were peoples. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
| A reaction: He must be thinking of the Old Testament histories here. (see Spinoza on that!). He says that the modern idea that these were all really the same god is ridiculous. |
| 19841 | Sometimes full liberty is only possible at the expense of some complete enslavement [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: There are some unfortunate circumstances where one's liberty can be preserved only at the expense of someone else's, and where the citizen can be perfectly free only if the slave is completely enslaved. Such was the situation in Sparta. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.15) | |
| A reaction: Rousseau wrote just before the moment when it was seen that slavery in European empires might be abolished, but he was not in the forefront of thought on this one. Greek philosophy would probably never have happened without slavery. |
| 19847 | We can never assume that the son of a slave is a slave [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: To decide that the son of a slave is born a slave is to decide that he is not a man. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.2) | |
| A reaction: Obviously this is because men are 'born free', though I am not clear how that maxim can be reached. I take it for granted that African slaves in the Americas found themselves born into slavery. No justification was required. |
| 7242 | Appetite alone is slavery, and self-prescribed laws are freedom [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: To be governed by appetite alone is slavery, while obedience to a law one prescribes to oneself is freedom. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.8) | |
| A reaction: An interesting formulation, sitting somewhere between Aristotle and Kant. The problem is to find a metaethic which will justify the prescription and nature of the self-imposed law. |
| 19845 | A person is free to renounce their state, as long as it is not a moment of crisis [Grotius, by Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Grotius thinks that each person can renounce his state and leave the country. (n15: provided it is not to evade one's duty the moment the homeland needs us; this would be criminal and punishable; it would not be withdrawal, but desertion) | |
| From: report of Hugo Grotius (On the Law of War and Peace [1625]) by Jean-Jacques Rousseau - The Social Contract (tr Cress) III.18 | |
| A reaction: The obvious example is Britons going to America in 1939, or (more controversially) conscripts going to Canada to avoid fighting in Vietnam. I'm unclear whether the idea in the note is that of Grotius or of Rousseau). Is tax exile OK, then? |
| 19800 | The social compact imposes conventional equality of rights on people who may start unequally [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Instead of destroying natural equality, the fundamental compact substitutes a moral and legitimate equality to any natural physical inequality. ...so that men all become equal by convention and by right. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.9) | |
| A reaction: This does not pretend that equality is a natural right. The imposition of equality is virtually the main point of forming a state. Effectively, the state operates like an insurance company, treating all contributors as equal. |
| 7248 | No citizen should be rich enough to buy another, and none so poor as forced to sell himself [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Where wealth is concerned, no citizen should be rich enough to buy another, and none should be so poor as to be forced to sell himself. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.11) | |
| A reaction: Rousseau is thinking of slavery, but this also points to prostitution as a key indicator of social equality. In Victorian Britain it seems that extensive prostituion was unavoidable; nowadays it looks more like a voluntary choice (for indigenous Britons). |
| 19794 | If we all give up all of our rights together to the community, we will always support one another [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The social compact reduces to a single clause, namely the total alienation of each associate, together with all of his rights, to the entire community. Since this condition is equal for everyone, no one has an interest in making it burdensome for others. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.6) | |
| A reaction: He speaks elsewhere of basic natural rights which can never be alienated, such as self-defence. It is what small groups do all the time, if they start off as equals. Difficult to manage with large groups. Factions are the problem. |
| 7241 | In society man loses natural liberty, but gains a right to civil liberty and property [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: What man loses by the social contract is his natural liberty and the absolute right to anything that tempts him; what he gains is civil liberty and the legal rights of propery in what he possesses. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.8) | |
| A reaction: It is an appealing idea that the purpose of society is to increase liberty, not to restrict it. That, on the whole, is my view. American libertarianism opens up the world to gun crime, vigilantes, pornographers and bounty-hunters. |
| 19806 | We alienate to society only what society needs - but society judges that, not us [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Each person alienates, by the social compact, only that portion of his power, his goods, and liberty whose use is of consequence to the community; but we must also grant that only the sovereign is the judge of what is of consequence. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.04) | |
| A reaction: The weakness here is how society sees its needs. He seems to assume that two societies will arrive at almost identical general wills, but Spartans, Prussians and Serbs may require the lives of your children for the state. |
| 19799 | Private property must always be subordinate to ownership by the whole community [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Each private individual's right to his very own store is always subordinate to the community's right to all, without which there could be neither solidity in the social fabric nor real force in the exercise of sovereignty. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.9) | |
| A reaction: This may sound a bit drastic, but every country practices this principle, seen in compulsory purchase orders (e.g. to build a railway line). In liberal democracies you expect good compensation. In communist Roumania you were just moved. Also taxation. |
| 23179 | People differ in their social degrees, and a particular type of right applies to each [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: There are many differences of degrees among men, for instance, some are soldiers, some are priests, some are princes. Therefore some special kind of right should be alloted to them. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], II-II Q57 4) | |
| A reaction: An objection (3), but Aquinas endorses it in his reply. In 58.10 he says striking a prince is worse that striking a commoner. The shift to the idea that everyone is supposed to be equal before the law has been slow, and we are not quite there yet. |
| 19819 | The state ensures liberty, so civil law separates citizens, and binds them to the state [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The relationship of members to each other should be as small as possible, and as large as possible to the entire body. ...Only the force of the state brings about the liberty of its members. From this relationship civil laws arise. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.12) | |
| A reaction: I'm guessing that these laws could be said mainly to prescribe both our rights and our duties. His four types of law are political, civil, criminal, and customary. |
| 23174 | Natural law is a rational creature's participation in eternal law [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: It is evident that the natural law is nothing else than the rational creature's participation of the eternal law. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], I-II Q91 2) | |
| A reaction: It is not enough merely that God decrees eternal laws. It is also necessary for us to use reason in order to participate. I'm not sure what reasoning process is involved. |
| 22133 | Grotius and Pufendorf based natural law on real (rather than idealised) humanity [Grotius, by Ford,JD] |
| Full Idea: Grotius and Pufendorf transformed the natural law tradition by starting from identifiable traits of human nature rather than ideas about what human beings ought to be. | |
| From: report of Hugo Grotius (On the Law of War and Peace [1625]) by J.D. Ford - Pufendorf, Samuel p.863 |
| 7406 | A natural right of self-preservation is balanced by a natural law to avoid unnecessary harm [Grotius, by Tuck] |
| Full Idea: For Grotius, there was a fundamental 'natural right' of self-preservation upon which all known moralities and codes of social behaviour must have been constructed, but it is balanced by a fundament duty or 'natural law' to abstain from harming others. | |
| From: report of Hugo Grotius (On the Law of War and Peace [1625]) by Richard Tuck - Hobbes Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: This theory has the virtue of economy, but I don't see how you can clearly justify those particular natural rights and laws, without allowing others to creep in, such as a right to a decent share of food, or a law requiring some fairness. |
| 7245 | Natural justice, without sanctions, benefits the wicked, who exploit it [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The laws of natural justice, lacking any natural sanctions, are unavailing among men. In fact, such laws merely benefit the wicked and injure the just, since the just respect them while others do not do so in return. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.06) | |
| A reaction: This seems a very accurate observation, and points us towards either contracts, or a justification of the use of force by good people. |
| 22113 | Right and wrong actions pertain to natural law, as perceived by practical reason [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: All things to be done or to be avoided pertain to the precepts of natural law, which practical reasoning apprehends naturally as being human goods. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia IIae.Q94.2c), quoted by Kretzmann/Stump - Aquinas, Thomas 13 | |
| A reaction: No mention of God, but you feel the divine presence in the background. He also cites 'eternal law'. No coincidence that the atheist Hobbes rejected natural law. Personally I would offer an atheistic defence of natural law, based on human nature. |
| 22114 | Tyrannical laws are irrational, and so not really laws [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: A tyrannical law, since it is not in accord with reason, is not unconditionally a law, but is rather a perversion of law. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia IIae.Q92.1, ad 4), quoted by Kretzmann/Stump - Aquinas, Thomas 13 | |
| A reaction: Only a belief in natural law can give a basis for such a claim. Positivists will say a tyrannical law is unconditionally a law like any other, but a bad one. |
| 7403 | Grotius ignored elaborate natural law theories, preferring a basic right of self-preservation [Grotius, by Tuck] |
| Full Idea: Grotius said there was a minimum core of morality (based on self-preservation), and disregarded the elaborate accounts of principles of natural law which Aristotelians had always sought to develop. | |
| From: report of Hugo Grotius (On the Law of War and Peace [1625]) by Richard Tuck - Hobbes Ch.1 | |
| A reaction: Aquinas would be the key Aristotelian here. I tend towards the Aristotelian view. If you go for the minimal view, it is not clear why there is a 'right' to self-preservation, rather than a mere desire for it. |
| 19809 | We accept the death penalty to prevent assassinations, so we must submit to it if necessary [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Whoever wills the end also wills the means. ...The death penalty inflicted on criminals can be viewed from more or less this point of view. It is in order to avoid being the victim of an assassin that a person consents to die, were he to become one. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.05) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be roughly the spirit in which Socrates submitted to his death. I doubt whether many criminals agree with harsh punishments dished out to other criminals who get caught. |
| 19810 | A trial proves that a criminal has broken the social treaty, and is no longer a member of the state [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The legal proceeding and judgement are the proofs and the declaration that a criminal has broken the social treaty, and consequently that he is no longer a member of the state. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.05) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be a plausible rationalisation of capital punishment, but what about lesser crimes. Is the interior of a prison a sort of temporary exile from the state? Hence the significance of whether prisoners are allowed to vote. But 19811. |
| 19811 | Only people who are actually dangerous should be executed, even as an example [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: There is no wicked man who could not be made good for something. One has the right to put to death, even as an example, only someone who cannot be preserved without danger. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.05) | |
| A reaction: This formulation implies that we could execute a dangerous person as a deterrent, even though they were not guilty of this particular crime. I suspect that Rousseau was too nice to go through with that. |
| 7291 | For Aquinas a war must be in a just cause, have proper authority, and aim at good [Aquinas, by Grayling] |
| Full Idea: Aquinas argued that on three conditions war can be justified: first, that there is a just cause; second, that it is begun on proper authority; and third, that it is waged with right intention, for 'the advancement of good, or the avoidance of evil'. | |
| From: report of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], II) by A.C. Grayling - Among the Dead Cities Ch.6 | |
| A reaction: But see also Idea 7292. Nowadays we are rightly suspicious of all three conditions. Evil people seem to think their cause is just; authority has often been seized by violence, or is being abused; and people seem confused about what is good or evil. |
| 7236 | War gives no right to inflict more destruction than is necessary for victory [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: War gives no right to inflict any more destruction than is necessary for victory. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], I.4) | |
| A reaction: This is the principle at stake in discussion of the bombing of Germany in 1942-5. We all seem to agree with this principle, and are shocked by breaches of it, but I am not sure why. Destruction must be a fundamentally bad thing - a basic value. |
| 23585 | It is permissible in a just cause to capture a place in neutral territory [Grotius] |
| Full Idea: It is permissible for one who is waging a just war to take possession of a place situated in a country free from hostilities. | |
| From: Hugo Grotius (On the Law of War and Peace [1625], II.ii.x), quoted by Michael Walzer - Just and Unjust Wars 15 n | |
| A reaction: This rejects Combatant Equality, allowing the just to do what is morally forbidden to the unjust. |
| 23607 | Wars are between States, not people, and the individuals are enemies by accident [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: War is something that occurs not between man and man, but between States. The individuals who become involved in it are enemies only by accident. A State can have as its enemies only other States, not men at all. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], p.249), quoted by Jeff McMahan - Killing in War 2.5 | |
| A reaction: This is the classic statement of the collectivist view, which goes on to assert that the morality of warfare is quite different from ordinary morality. McMahan argues against this view, very persuasively. |
| 19850 | By separating theological and political systems, Jesus caused divisions in the state [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: In separating the theological system from the political system, Jesus made the state to cease being united and caused internal divisions. Since this new idea of an otherwordly kingdom had never entered the heads of pagans, they saw Christians as rebels. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
| A reaction: This is the sort of stuff that made Rousseau a vast number of enemies, which embittered him. It is the sort of cool assessment which became commonplace in Germany sixty year later. |
| 19852 | Civil religion needs one supreme god, an afterlife, justice, and the sanctity of the social contract [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Dogmas of civil religion should be simple. The existence of a powerful, intelligent, beneficent divinity that foresees and provides; the life to come; the happiness of the just; the punishment of the wicked; the sanctity of the social contract and laws. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
| A reaction: Notice that he gratuitously makes the social contract sacred (even though it can be voluntarily abandoned, and the general will can be changed). Presumably the foundation of any society, such as the ballot box, has to be sacred. |
| 19853 | All religions should be tolerated, if they tolerate each other, and support citizenship [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: Tolerance should be shown to all religions which tolerate other religions, so long as their dogmas contain nothing contrary to the duties of a citizen. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
| A reaction: Quite a good guideline for the attitude of western countries to middle eastern religious practices which arrive in their midst. Rousseau says the state has a minimal core religion (Idea 19852), which thus tolerates most other religions. |
| 19851 | Every society has a religion as its base [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: No state has ever been founded without religion serving as its base. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
| A reaction: It is not clear to me that the ancient Greek cities had religion as a 'base', though they all had a religion, and expected conformity. Religion doesn't figure much in Thucydides. Communist Russia was the first explicitly atheist state, I think. |
| 19836 | The amount of taxation doesn't matter, if it quickly circulates back to the citizens [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: It is not on the basis of the amount of taxation that the burden is measured, but on the basis of the path they have to travel in order to return to the hands from which they came. If circulation is prompt and regular, the amount one pays is unimportant. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], III.08) | |
| A reaction: So the problem is when the government wants to build up a surplus, or pay off debts (or is corrupt, or even if it is suspected of corruption). |
| 5508 | Aquinas says a fertilized egg is not human, and has no immortal soul [Aquinas, by Martin/Barresi] |
| Full Idea: In Aquinas's view the fertilized egg is not, either at the moment of conception or for quite a while afterwards, endowed with an immortal soul. In fact, technically speaking, it is not even human. | |
| From: report of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265]) by R Martin / J Barresi - Introduction to 'Personal Identity' p.20 | |
| A reaction: It is pointed at that therefore Aquinas does not give good support for modern Catholic views on abortion. There is certainly no reason why a human zygote should be ensouled from the start, as God may do this whenever He wishes. |
| 16687 | Bodies are three-dimensional substances [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Bodies are those substances in which one finds three dimensions. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia Q18.2c), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 16.2 | |
| A reaction: Pasnau points out that this extensional view of physical bodies was a commonplace long before Descartes. Presumably there are also non-dimensional substances (such as angels?). |
| 23178 | Divine law commands some things because they are good, while others are good because commanded [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: The divine law commands certain things because they are good and forbids others because they are evil, while others are good because they are prescribed, and others evil because they are forbidden. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], II-II Q57 2) | |
| A reaction: This is a fifty-fifty response to the Euthyphro dilemma, but it seems to leave the theological puzzle of the source of the goodness which is prescribed because it is in fact good. |
| 6892 | Moral principles have some validity without a God commanding obedience [Grotius, by Mautner] |
| Full Idea: In the Prolegomena to his work there is a famous statement that moral principles laid down in the work would have some degree of validity even if there was no God commanding obedience. | |
| From: report of Hugo Grotius (On the Law of War and Peace [1625]) by Thomas Mautner - Penguin Dictionary of Philosophy p.229 | |
| A reaction: I am not clear why Grotius felt obliged to qualify his claim with the phrase 'some degree'. I don't see how God's command can affect the 'validity' of morality, or how there can be a middle ground between dependence on and independence of God. |
| 21251 | We can't know God's essence, so his existence can't be self-evident for us [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Because we do not know the essence of God, the proposition 'God exists' is not self-evident to us, but needs to be demonstrated by things that are more known to us. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Art 1, Obj 3) | |
| A reaction: Depends on his definition of self-evidence (Idea 21250), which needs knowledge of the essence of the subject. Anselm required 'understanding' of the concept. One might understand the existence criteria without knowing the whole essence. Anselm wins. |
| 5614 | If you assume that there must be a necessary being, you can't say which being has this quality [Kant on Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: To those who assume the existence of a necessary being, and would only know which among all things had to be regarded as such a thing, one could not answer: This thing here is the necessary being | |
| From: comment on Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265]) by Immanuel Kant - Critique of Pure Reason A612/B640 | |
| A reaction: See Aquinas in Idea 1431. Kant makes a nice point. You might turn out to be the necessary being? How could you tell? You only know that there must be one lurking somewhere. I could be a slug. Aquinas makes a huge leap to God. |
| 21269 | Way 1: the infinite chain of potential-to-actual movement has to have a first mover [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: A thing can only be reduced from potentiality to actuality by something actual. A thing can never be in actuality and potentiality in the same respect. So what is moved must be moved by another. But this cannot go on to infinity, with no first mover. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia,Q02,Art3,Reply) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] This relies on the Aristotelian ideas of potentiality and actuality. We might talk about things moving, but lacking the 'power' to move. This is almost identical to Plato in 'The Laws' (which I guess Aquinas knew nothing of). |
| 21270 | Way 2: no effect without a cause, and this cannot go back to infinity, so there is First Cause [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: If there is no first cause among efficient causes, there is no ultimate or intermediate cause. That in efficient causes it is possible to go on to infinity is plainly false. So it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, which everyone calls God. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia,Q02,Art3,Reply) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] It doesn't seem to follow at all that the First Cause is God. There could be a single thing like the Phoenix, with unique self-causing properties. Or a quantum fluctuation. |
| 21271 | Way 3: contingent beings eventually vanish, so continuity needs a necessary being [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: That which can not-be at some time is not. So if everything can not-be, then once there was nothing in existence. If so, it would have been impossible for anything to have begun to exist. So there must be some being having of itself its own necessity. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia,Q02,Art3,Reply) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] Why can't things take it in turns to not-be, so that something is always on duty? Maybe it is a feature of things that they bring other things into existence (e.g. virtual particles)? |
| 21272 | Way 4: the source of all qualities is their maximum, so something (God) causes all perfections [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: More and less are predicated of different things according as they resemble in their different ways something which is the maximum. The maximum of a genus is the cause of all in that genus. So there must be something causing the perfections of all beings. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia,Q02,Art3,Reply) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] The argument makes a startling jump from each quality (like heat or nobility) having a maximum, to their being a single entity (a 'being' at that) which is the sole source of all human perfections. |
| 21273 | Way 5: mindless things act towards an obvious end, so there is an intelligent director [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Things which lack knowledge, such as natural bodies, act for an end, which is usually in the same way, to obtain the best result. Hence they achieve their end designedly. Hence some intelligent being exists by whom all natural things are directed. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia,Q02,Art3,Reply) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] This is Greek teleology with a vengeance. Plants probably illustrate best what he has in mind. There is obvious teleology in human affairs, and there is a sort of teleology in living things, but we take the end to be reinforced by success. |
| 20211 | Life aims at the Beatific Vision - of perfect happiness, and revealed truth [Aquinas, by Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Aquinas describes the ultimate end of human life as the Beatific Vision, a state that is simultaneously the enjoyment of perfect happiness and a perfect revelation of truth. | |
| From: report of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265]) by Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski - Virtues of the Mind II 4.2 | |
| A reaction: I like that a lot, even though my idea of the revelation of truth is very distant from that of Aquinas. Ignorant happiness is not much of an aspiration. |
| 7252 | A tyrant exploits Christians because they don't value this life, and are made to be slaves [Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The Christian spirit is too favourable to tyranny for tyranny not to take advantage of it. True Christians are made to be slaves; they know it and hardly care; this short life has too little value in their eyes. | |
| From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8) | |
| A reaction: This is strikingly close to Nietzsche's verdict on Christianity, that it is the essence of slave morality. It has certainly been my experience that Christians tend to be much more reluctant than other people to stand up to authority. |
| 22106 | Aquinas saw angels as separated forms, rather than as made of 'spiritual matter' [Aquinas, by Kretzmann/Stump] |
| Full Idea: Unlike some of his contemporaries, Aquinas does not think that there is a 'spiritual matter' that angels or disembodied souls have as one of their components, but rather that they are separated forms that configure no matter at all. | |
| From: report of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265]) by Kretzmann/Stump - Aquinas, Thomas 10 | |
| A reaction: 'Separated forms' sounds like the modern concept of abstract entities, meaning that souls and angels exist in the way that platonists believe numbers exist. How else might Aquinas have understood them? |
| 23306 | Humans have a non-physical faculty of reason, so they can be immortal [Aquinas, by Sorabji] |
| Full Idea: Aquinas infers from Aristotle that intellectual understanding is the only operation of the soul that is performed without a physical organ, so that only human souls, and not animal ones, can be immortal. | |
| From: report of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], I, q75, a3, resp) by Richard Sorabji - Rationality 'Reason' | |
| A reaction: This shows why so many thinkers are desperate to hang on to dualism, of some sort. Interesting that he only claims partial dualism. |
| 4412 | Those in bliss have their happiness increased by seeing the damned punished [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: In order that the bliss of the saints may be more delightful for them, and they may render more copious thanks to God for it, it is given to them to see perfectly the punishment of the damned. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], III Supp Q94,1), quoted by Friedrich Nietzsche - On the Genealogy of Morals I.§15 | |
| A reaction: This has probably been repudiated by the Church of England. Justice should be seen to be done. Presumably you mustn't gloat, or you join them. |
| 21266 | God does not exist, because He is infinite and good, and so no evil should be discoverable [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: If one of two contraries be infinite, the other would be altogether destroyed. But the name God means that He is infinite goodness. If therefore God existed there would be no evil discoverable; but there is evil in the world. Therefore God does not exist. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia,Q02,Art3,Ob1) | |
| A reaction: This is not, of course, the opinion of Aquinas. I love the way he states the opposition's arguments so lucidly. The modern problem usually talks of God's omnipotence, rather than infinity. His formulation allows that there might be undiscoverable evil. |
| 21274 | It is part of God's supreme goodness that He brings good even out of evil [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: As Augustine says, God would not allow any evil to exist in his works, unless he were to bring good even out of evil. It is part of the infinite goodness of God, that He allows evil to exist and out of it produces good. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicae [1265], Ia,Q02,Art3,Ob1rep) | |
| A reaction: Are God's powers so limited that He could not have achieved an equal amount of good without having to indulge in some evil first? |