87 ideas
| 2797 | As coherence expands its interrelations become steadily tighter, culminating only in necessary truth [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: As our system grows in coherence, the interrelations between its parts becomes tighter and tighter;… at the limit contingent truth vanishes, leaving only necessary truth. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 14.7) |
| 20121 | Grammar only reveals popular metaphysics [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The snares of grammar are the metaphysics of the people. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §354) | |
| A reaction: If you have this elitist view of metaphysics, then linguistic analysis is just a branch of anthropology. |
| 24082 | Is the will to truth the desire to avoid deception? [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: This unconditional will to truth: what is it? Is it the will not to let oneself be deceived? Is it the will not to deceive? | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §344) | |
| A reaction: He is hunting for the evolutionary origin of the love of truth, in the needs of a community. In that sense, I would have thought it was just the pressure to get the facts right, because error is dangerous. Nice thought, though. |
| 2768 | The correspondence theory also has the problem that two sets of propositions might fit the facts equally well [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The correspondence theory as well as the coherence theory has the problem of more than one set of truths. Why can't two sets of propositions "fit the facts" equally well? | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 8.2) |
| 2765 | Rescher says that if coherence requires mutual entailment, this leads to massive logical redundancy [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Rescher complains that if coherence requires mutual entailment, then what is entailed is logically redundant, and the whole system is infected with mutual redundancy. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 8.1) |
| 2769 | If one theory is held to be true, all the other theories appear false, because they can't be added to the true one [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: From the point of view of someone with a theory every other theory is false, because it cannot be added to the true theory. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 8.2) |
| 2766 | Even with a tight account of coherence, there is always the possibility of more than one set of coherent propositions [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: No matter how tight our account of coherence we have to admit that there may be more than one set of coherent propositions (as Russell pointed out (1907)). | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 8.2) |
| 20360 | We Germans value becoming and development more highly than mere being of what 'is' [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: We Germans are Hegelians insofar as we instinctively attribute a deeper sense and richer value to becoming and development than to what 'is'. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §357) | |
| A reaction: I always doubt Nietzsche's claims about 'we Germans' or 'we philosophers'. They say that, intellectually, everyone is either French or German, and my immediate response was to embrace being German. So becoming is where it's at. |
| 2781 | Realism says that most perceived objects exist, and have some of their perceived properties [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Realism in the theory of perception is that objects we perceive usually do exist, and retain some at least of the properties we perceive them as having. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.2) |
| 24077 | Necessity is thought to require an event, but is only an after-effect of the event [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Necessity is supposed to be the cause of something coming to be: in truth it is often only an effect of what has come to be. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §205) | |
| A reaction: This sounds like an account of the traditional idea of destiny - which sees inevitability in some major event, which was previously unpredictable. |
| 20126 | The strength of knowledge is not its truth, but its entrenchment in our culture [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The strength of knowledge does not depend on its degree of truth but on its age, on the degree to which it has been incoporated, in its character as a condition of life. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §110) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be the rather modern idea (in Foucault, perhaps) of knowledge as a central component of culture, rather than as an eternal revelation of facts. Note that he is talking about its 'strength', not its veracity or degree of support. |
| 2745 | A pupil who lacks confidence may clearly know something but not be certain of it [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Why isn't certainty required for knowledge? Because we are often prepared to allow that someone does in fact have knowledge when the person is so uncertain they would not claim knowledge for themselves (the 'diffident schoolboy'). | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 2.1) |
| 2755 | If senses are fallible, then being open to correction is an epistemological virtue [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: In my view, once we admit that our beliefs about our sensory states are not infallible, incorrigibility would be a vice rather than a virtue. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 4.3) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be axiomatic among modern philosophers, and I certainly agree with it. |
| 5677 | Naïve direct realists hold that objects retain all of their properties when unperceived [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The naïve direct realist holds that unperceived objects are able to retain properties of all the types we perceive them as having, which includes not only a shape and a size, but also a colour, a taste and a smell. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.3) | |
| A reaction: This I take to be a completely untenable view, if we are including the qualia of red, sweet or pungent among the properties. It seems uncontroversial that objects retain the capacity to cause redness etc. when they are unperceived. |
| 5678 | Scientific direct realism says we know some properties of objects directly [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The scientific direct realist accepts the directness of our perception of the world, but restricts his realism to a special group of properties, ..not including those which are dependent for their existence upon the existence of a perceiver. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.3) | |
| A reaction: Dancy goes on to say that this distinction is a 'close relative' of Locke's primary/secondary distinction. Am I a direct realist or a representative realist about primary properties? Maybe the distinction dissolves as we unravel the true process. |
| 5681 | Maybe we are forced from direct into indirect realism by the need to explain perceptual error [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Direct realism is unlikely to be able to provide an explanation of perceptual error without collapsing into indirect realism. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.3) | |
| A reaction: If there is an error, there must be two things which don't match: the perception, and the reality. This seems to me a powerful reason for preferring indirect or representative realism. I like the idea that we make mental 'models' (rather than inferences). |
| 5682 | Internal realism holds that we perceive physical objects via mental objects [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Indirect realism holds that in perception we are indirectly aware of the physical objects around us in virtue of a direct awareness of internal, non-physical objects. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.4) | |
| A reaction: This may be a slightly prejudicial definition which invites insoluble questions about the ontological status of the internal 'objects'. It seems to me obvious that we create some sort of inner 'models' or constructions in the process of perception. |
| 5683 | Indirect realism depends on introspection, the time-lag, illusions, and neuroscience [Dancy,J, by PG] |
| Full Idea: The four standard reasons for preferring indirect to direct realism are introspection of our mental processes, the time-lag argument, the argument from illusion, and the findings of neuroscience. | |
| From: report of Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.4) by PG - Db (ideas) | |
| A reaction: Ultimately one's views about realism depend on one's views of the mind/brain, and it is the last of the four reasons that sways me. We know enough about the complexity of the brain to accept that it represents reality, with no additional ontology. |
| 2778 | Phenomenalism includes possible experiences, but idealism only refers to actual experiences [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Phenomenalism talks about actual and possible experiences, whereas idealism confines itself to the actual experiences. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 9.5) |
| 5684 | Eliminative idealists say there are no objects; reductive idealists say objects exist as complex experiences [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The eliminativist idealist holds that there is no such thing as a material object; there is nothing but experience (idea, sensation). The reductive idealist holds that there are material objects, but they are nothing other than complexes of experience. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.6) | |
| A reaction: Dancy says Berkeley was of the latter type. The distinction doesn't strike me as entirely clear. I can't make much sense of the words 'are' or 'exist' in the second theory. To say it is only experiences translates (to me) as 'doesn't exist'. |
| 2777 | Extreme solipsism only concerns current experience, but it might include past and future [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Extreme solipsism only considers present experiences, but more relaxed solipsism may include past and possible future experiences. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 9.5) |
| 2794 | Knowing that a cow is not a horse seems to be a synthetic a priori truth [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The fact that a cow is not a horse is a candidate for a priori synthetic truth. It doesn't seem to be analytic, because you can know what a cow is without knowing what a horse is. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 14.3) |
| 2780 | Perception is either direct realism, indirect realism, or phenomenalism [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: There are three main families of theories of perception: direct realism, indirect realism, and phenomenalism. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.2) |
| 20119 | We became increasingly conscious of our sense impressions in order to communicate them [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The emergence of our sense impressions into our consciousness, the ability to fix them and, as it were, exhibit them externally, increased proportionally with the need to communicate them to others by means of signs. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §354) | |
| A reaction: He says in the same section that such ideas (plus his thoughts on consciousness) are the essence of his 'Perspectivism'. In effect, knowledge is not an individual activity, but a team game |
| 5680 | For direct realists the secondary and primary qualities seem equally direct [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: For a direct realist our awareness of colour and heat can hardly be of a different order from our awareness of shape and size. Both sorts of properties are presented with equal directness. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.3) | |
| A reaction: This is a good objection to 'direct scientific realism', which claims direct apprehension of primary qualities alongside a totally relative view of secondary qualities. The best response seems to be to move to a representative view of primary properties. |
| 5679 | We can't grasp the separation of quality types, or what a primary-quality world would be like [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: There is doubt about whether our experience of the world is such that we can conceive of the sort of separation of primary and secondary qualities which the scientific view calls for, and can understand what the world is like with no secondary qualities. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.3) | |
| A reaction: Dancy attributes these doubts to Berkeley (e.g. Idea 3837). I think what is claimed here is false. Obviously we spend our whole lives immersed in secondary qualities, but separating the different aspects is precisely what scientists (and philosophers) do. |
| 2782 | We can be looking at distant stars which no longer actually exist [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: An object such as a distant star can have ceased to exist by the moment at which we are directly aware of it. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.2) |
| 2775 | It is not clear from the nature of sense data whether we should accept them as facts [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The question whether something which appears as datum should remain as accepted fact is one which is not even partially determined by its origin as datum. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 8.5) |
| 2784 | Appearances don't guarantee reality, unless the appearance is actually caused by the reality [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: If I stare at a white wall with my brain wired to a virtual reality computer, and it generates a white wall, we wouldn't say I am seeing reality. It seems that the wall itself must in some way cause my perception of it. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 11.4) | |
| A reaction: But suppose the computer generated in my mind an image of the wall which was actually in front of me? And suppose the computer got its image from the identical wall next door, not from mine? And it was only judged identical because the architect said so |
| 2785 | Perceptual beliefs may be directly caused, but generalisations can't be [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: A perceptual belief that p can have as its main cause the fact that p. More general facts (all men are mortal; e=mc2) cannot be the main cause of my belief, even if they do function causally in some way. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 11.5) | |
| A reaction: Note that the perceptual belief can be the "main" cause; it seems to me that most beliefs are caused by judgements, though I may normally accept beliefs which are directly caused by perception, if I have no reason to challenge them. |
| 2788 | If perception and memory are indirect, then two things stand between mind and reality [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: If perception is indirect as well as memory, this means there are two direct objects of awareness between the remembering mind and the original object. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 12.2) |
| 2787 | Memories aren't directly about the past, because time-lags and illusions suggest representation [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Direct realism about memory believes the memory is the past. But the time-lag argument and various illusions are powerful here, suggesting indirect realism involving a memory image. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 12.2) |
| 2791 | Phenomenalism about memory denies the past, or reduces it to present experience [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Eliminative phenomenalism about memory holds that there is no such thing as the past, just certain present experiences; reductive phenomenalism holds that there is a past, but it is no more than a complex of those present experiences. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 12.4) |
| 2790 | I can remember plans about the future, and images aren't essential (2+3=5) [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Memory is not solely concerned with the past, let alone one's own past (I remember that I must be in London next week), and need not involve images (2+2=4). | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 12.3) | |
| A reaction: I can hardly remember the future, so I presume I am remembering my past commitment to go to London, even if I visualise the future with me in London. The non-necessity of images seems right. I can remember the Mona Lisa without a precise image. |
| 8840 | There are five possible responses to the problem of infinite regress in justification [Cleve] |
| Full Idea: Sceptics respond to the regress problem by denying knowledge; Foundationalists accept justifications without reasons; Positists say reasons terminate is mere posits; Coherentists say mutual support is justification; Infinitists accept the regress. | |
| From: James Van Cleve (Why coherence is not enough [2005], I) | |
| A reaction: A nice map of the territory. The doubts of Scepticism are not strong enough for anyone to embrace the view; Foundationalist destroy knowledge (?), as do Positists; Infinitism is a version of Coherentism - which is the winner. |
| 2754 | Foundations are justified by non-beliefs, or circularly, or they need no justification [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Foundationalism can get rid of the regress argument with one of three types of belief: those justified by something other than beliefs, those which justify themselves, or those which need no justification. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 4.3) | |
| A reaction: A nice clear trilemma, and none of them will do, which is why foundationalism is false. I vote for Davidson's view, that only a belief can justify another belief. |
| 2749 | For internalists we must actually know that the fact caused the belief [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The internalist would claim that even if the belief is caused by the true fact to which it refers, it is also necessary that the believer believes that this is how their belief arose, and not some other way. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 3.5) | |
| A reaction: I'm converted to internalism. If the belief is externally supported in the right way, then it may well be a true belief, but knowledge needs critical faculties, and justifications which can be articulated. |
| 2770 | Internalists tend to favour coherent justification, but not the coherence theory of truth [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Internalists such as Keith Lehrer tend to suggest that we adopt a coherence theory of justification but reject the coherence theory of truth. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 8.3) | |
| A reaction: I agree with Lehrer. Truth just isn't coherence, for all sorts of well known reasons (found in this database!). High coherence can be totally false. For justification, though, it is the best we have. |
| 20122 | We have no organ for knowledge or truth; we only 'know' what is useful to the human herd [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: We simply lack any organ for knowledge, for 'truth'; we 'know' [das Erkennen] (or believe or imagine) just as much as may be useful in the interests of the human herd, the species; and this 'utility' is ultimately also a mere belief. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §354) | |
| A reaction: [Section §354 is fascinating!] An odd idea, that we can only have truth is we have an 'organ' for it. It seems plausible that the whole brain is a truth machine. This seems like pure pragmatism, with all its faults. Falsehoods can be useful. |
| 8841 | Modern foundationalists say basic beliefs are fallible, and coherence is relevant [Cleve] |
| Full Idea: Contemporary foundationalists are seldom of the strong Cartesian variety: they do not insist that basic beliefs be absolutely certain. They also tend to allow that coherence can enhance justification. | |
| From: James Van Cleve (Why coherence is not enough [2005], III) | |
| A reaction: It strikes me that they have got onto a slippery slope. How certain are the basic beliefs? How do you evaluate their certainty? Could incoherence in their implications undermine them? Skyscrapers need perfect foundations. |
| 2752 | Foundationalism requires inferential and non-inferential justification [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The core of any form of foundationalism is the view that there are two forms of justification - inferential and non-inferential - and that non-inferential justification must be possible to avoid a sceptical regress. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 4.1) | |
| A reaction: The foundation may be non-inferential, but is it also non-evidential, or devoid of any support at all, apart from its own eloquent self? I can't buy that, I'm afraid. |
| 2771 | Foundationalists must accept not only the basic beliefs, but also rules of inference for further progress [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Foundationalists suppose we need not only basic beliefs, but also principles of inference to move to the more sophisticated superstructure. We may understand what justifies the basic beliefs, but what about the inference principles? | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 8.3) | |
| A reaction: Very nice question. Of course, you can't justify everything, but each part of a system can be scrutinised in turn by the other parts (with scrutinising principles tested pragmatically). |
| 2756 | If basic beliefs can be false, falsehood in non-basic beliefs might by a symptom [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Falsehood in a non-basic belief would be a reason to doubt the basic beliefs which support it, once we have admitted that basic beliefs can be false. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 4.3) | |
| A reaction: The yearning for foundations arises from the yearning for certainty. If one embraces the fallibilist view of knowledge, as I do, then there is little motivation for foundationalism. |
| 2753 | Beliefs can only be infallible by having almost no content [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Infallible beliefs must have vanishingly small content. No belief with enough content to support the superstructure in which we are really interested is going to be infallible. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 4.2) | |
| A reaction: I see no reason why a foundationalist should not be a fallibilist, rather than insisting on the infallibility of their basic beliefs. I don't, though, see how basic beliefs can count as knowledge. |
| 2773 | Coherentism gives a possible justification of induction, and opposes scepticism [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Coherentists feel that their approach provides a possible justification for induction, and offers a general stance from which the sceptic can be defused, if not rebutted. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 8.3) | |
| A reaction: These are two good reasons why I vote for coherentism (about justification, NOT about truth). Coherence is the main tool for leading us to the best explanation. |
| 2779 | Idealists must be coherentists, but coherentists needn't be idealists [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: An idealist should perhaps be a coherentist, but there seems to be no reason why the coherentist should be an idealist; the link between the two is all one-way. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 9.5) | |
| A reaction: I don't see why an idealist shouldn't be a rationalist foundationalist, with a private reality full of certainties founded on simple a priori truths. Personally I'm an empiricist coherentist, this week. |
| 2786 | For coherentists justification and truth are not radically different things [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The coherentist idea is that justification and truth are not properties of radically different types. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 11.6) | |
| A reaction: Oh. And I thought I was a coherentist. It take it that keeping coherence for foundations separate from coherence as truth is absolutely basic. The latter is nonsense. |
| 2767 | If it is empirical propositions which have to be coherent, this eliminates coherent fiction [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: If coherence is grounded in, and is trying to make sense of, a set of empirical propositions, this will eliminate some of the more fanciful sets of coherent propositions, such as the complete Sherlock Holmes stories. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 8.2) | |
| A reaction: Interestingly, I suspect that embracing the coherence view of justification drives one back to empiricisim (pace Bonjour), because that is the most authoritative part of the pattern of beliefs. |
| 2776 | Externalism could even make belief unnecessary (e.g. in animals) [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: One reading of the externalist approach may lead to a rejection of the belief condition for knowledge (in animals, perhaps). | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 9.3) | |
| A reaction: At this point the concept of 'knowledge' seems to disperse into the mist. This pushes me to a 'setting the bar high' view of knowledge. Otherwise plants will have it, and we don't want that. |
| 2746 | How can a causal theory of justification show that all men die? [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: How can a causal analysis of justification show that I know that all men die? | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 2.3) | |
| A reaction: I presume he means that inductive generalisations can't be purely causal. The claim that men are immortal is absurd because it is 'unconnected' to what actually happens. |
| 2747 | Causal theories don't allow for errors in justification [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Causal accounts of justification do not allow for the possibility that a false belief may still be justified. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 2.4) | |
| A reaction: Good. If you switch to what you only think is the cause of your belief, you have gone internalist and ruined the party. You can't deny that a falsehood can be justified, or justification is vacuous. |
| 2772 | Coherentism moves us towards a more social, shared view of knowledge [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: An advantage of coherentism is that it directs attention away from the individual's struggle to achieve knowledge (the classical conception), and points to knowledge as a social phenomenon, shared, and increased by means of sharing. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 8.3) | |
| A reaction: This is exactly the view which I now embrace. Internal coherence is the basis, but that spills out into the community, and into books, and into the relativity of social acceptance. |
| 2743 | What is the point of arguing against knowledge, if being right undermines your own argument? [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: What is the point of arguing that justified belief is impossible, for if you were right there could be no reasons for your conclusion? | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 1.3) |
| 4423 | We assume causes, geometry, motion, bodies etc to live, but they haven't been proved [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: We have fixed up a world for ourselves in which we can live, with bodies, lines, planes, causes, motion and form; without these articles of faith nobody would endure life. But that does not mean they have been proved. Life is no argument. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §121) | |
| A reaction: It is hard to disagree. A lot of recent thought suggests that they are Hume's 'natural beliefs', like truth and induction, which simply can't be proved. 'Unprovable' does not mean 'incorrect', however. |
| 6579 | Nietzsche's perspectivism says our worldview depends on our personality [Nietzsche, by Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: Nietzsche recommends an extreme version of perspectivism in holding that a person's view of the world is a function of that person's life-affirming (Heraclitean) or life-denying (Parmenidean) personality. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882]) by Robert Fogelin - Walking the Tightrope of Reason Ch.3 | |
| A reaction: Fogelin recommends Nehamas on this topic. I am not convinced Nietzsche takes such an individual view as is implied here. See Idea 4420, for example. This view is in tune with Charles Taylor's view that our values shape our understanding of our selves. |
| 24083 | It would be absurd to say we are only permitted our own single perspective [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: I think today we are at least far removed from the ridiculous immodesty of decreeing from our corner that one is permitted to have perspectives only from this corner. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §374) | |
| A reaction: He goes on to speculate about the possibility of infinite perspectives, most of them unknowable to us. But Nietzsche was not a simple relativism. The obvious concept needed to accompany a many-perspectives view is consensus. |
| 2751 | Probabilities can only be assessed relative to some evidence [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: In Probability Calculus probability is only assessed relative to some evidence. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 4.1) |
| 2757 | The argument from analogy rests on one instance alone [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: As an inductive argument Mill's argument from analogy (other people have inputs and outputs like mine, so the intermediate explanation must be the same) is weak because it is based on a single instance. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 5.3) | |
| A reaction: The argument may be 'weak' as a piece of pure logic, but when faced with a strange situation, one's own case seems like crucial evidence, like a single eye-witness to a crime. |
| 2758 | You can't separate mind and behaviour, as the analogy argument attempts [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The analogy argument makes the error (as Wittgenstein showed) of assuming that mind is quite separate from behaviour, and yet I can understand what it is for others to have mental states, which is contradictory. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 5.3) | |
| A reaction: It has always seemed to me that Wittgenstein is excessively behaviourist, and he always seems to be flirting with eliminative views of mind, so he was never bothered about other minds. Minds aren't separate from behaviour, but they are distinct. |
| 20115 | All of our normal mental life could be conducted without consciousness [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: We could think, feel, will and remember, and we could also 'act', and yet none of this would have to enter our consciousness. The whole of life would be possible without, as it were, seeing itself in a mirror. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §354) | |
| A reaction: He credits Leibniz with this line of thought. Nowadays the unconscious aspects of thought are a commonplace, not just from Freud, but from neuroscience. We have no idea how conscious other animals are. Nietzsche attributes consciousness to communication. |
| 20117 | Only the need for communication has led to consciousness developing [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: I surmise that consciousness has developed only under the pressure of the need for communication; ...consciousness is really only a net of communication between human beings. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §354) | |
| A reaction: An interesting speculation, well ahead of its time. Given that thought does not require consciousness, as he claims, it is not quite clear why communication needs it. Presumably two robots can communicate. But Idea 20118 is good. |
| 20118 | Only our conscious thought is verbal, and this shows the origin of consciousness [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Only conscious thinking takes the form of words, which is to say signs of communication, and this fact uncovers the origin of consciousness. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §354) | |
| A reaction: Chicken-and-egg question here. Persinally I take consciousnes to be associated with meta-thought, which bestows huge power, and I take language to arise from meta-thought. |
| 20116 | Most of our lives, even the important parts, take place outside of consciousness [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: By far the greatest proportion of our life takes place without this mirroring effect [of consciousness]; and this is true even of our thinking, feeling and willing life, however offensive this may sound to older philosophers. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §354) | |
| A reaction: Nietzsche didn't just hint at the possibility of a (Freudian) sub-conscious - he was whole-heartedly committed to it, and Freud gave him credit for it. I think philosophers are only just beginning to digest this crucial idea. |
| 20120 | Whatever moves into consciousness becomes thereby much more superficial [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Whatever becomes conscious becomes by the same token shallow, thin, relatively stupid, general, sign, herd signal; all becoming conscious involves a great and thorough corruption, falsification, reduction to superficialities, and generalisation. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §354) | |
| A reaction: Nietzsche would have made a great speech writer for someone. This vision is increasingly how I see people. It is a view reinforced by modern neuroscience, which suggests that we greatly overestimate the conscious part of ourselves. |
| 2932 | 'Know thyself' is impossible and ridiculous [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: "Everybody is farthest away - from himself"; and the maxim "know thyself" addressed to human beings by a god, is almost malicious. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §335) | |
| A reaction: Expressed with characteristcally Nietzschean brio, but I couldn't agree more, and it is a very important truth. You can only require full self-knowledge if the whole mind is available to be known, and that isn't even remotely the case. |
| 24078 | Thoughts cannot be fully reproduced in words [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Even one's thoughts one cannot reproduce entirely in words. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §244) | |
| A reaction: I suppose this is the germ of Derrida, who seems to see little connection between thought and speech. I take this idea to be entirely correct. Our simplistic view of language reduces the fluidity and many dimensions of thought to a pile of lego bricks. |
| 24081 | Most of our intellectual activity is unconscious [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Only now is the truth dawning on us that the biggest part by far of our intellectual activity takes place unconsciously, and unfelt by us. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §333) | |
| A reaction: Note that this is 'intellectual activity', and just the hidden rumblings of instincts and emotions. I think he is right. Philosophers want to verbalise everything, but I don't think the main insights of philosophical thinking are verbal. |
| 2744 | Verificationism (the 'verification principle') is an earlier form of anti-realism [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Verificationism (the 'verification principle') is an earlier form of anti-realism. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 1.note) | |
| A reaction: If the one true God announced that there is a real world out there, I might take that as a verification of the fact. |
| 2760 | Logical positivism implies foundationalism, by dividing weak from strong verifications [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: The foundationalist claim that there are inferential and non-inferential justifications is mirrored by the claim of logical empiricism (the verification principle) that all significant statements are either strongly or weakly verifiable. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 6.2) | |
| A reaction: I take it to be characteristic of both to divide the support for something into two types, one of which is basic, and the other built up on the basics. The first step is to decide what is basic. |
| 2761 | If the meanings of sentences depend on other sentences, how did we learn language? [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: It is clearly possible to learn a language from scratch, because we have all done it, but if holism is true and the meaning of each sentence depends on the meanings of others, how did we do it? | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 7.2) | |
| A reaction: The question of 'how did it ever get started?' actually seems to block almost every explanation of everything that ever happens. How do I begin to move my hand? |
| 2763 | There is an indeterminacy in juggling apparent meanings against probable beliefs [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Indeterminacy stems from an interplay between belief and meaning, as with a man who tells you he keeps two rhinoceri in the fridge and squeezes the juice of one for a drink each morning. | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 7.4) | |
| A reaction: I don't understand why an 'interplay' is called an 'indeterminacy'. Typical philosophers. Close examination will usually show whether the change is just in belief, or just in meaning, or in both. |
| 2762 | Charity makes native beliefs largely true, and Humanity makes them similar to ours [Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: One criterion for successful translation is that it show native beliefs to be largely true (Principle of Charity), and another is that it imputes to natives beliefs we can make sense of them having (Principle of Humanity). | |
| From: Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 7.4) | |
| A reaction: The trouble with such guidelines is that they always have to be 'all things being equal'. Sometimes the natives are really idiotic, and sometimes their attitudes seem quite inhuman. |
| 2933 | Why do you listen to the voice of your conscience? [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Why do you listen to the voice of your conscience? | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §335) | |
| A reaction: Nice question. It is perfectly plausible to say that I seem to feel guilty about doing something, but can't see any reason why I should. |
| 20141 | Higher human beings see and hear far more than others, and do it more thoughtfully [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: What distinguishes the higher human being from the lower is that the former see and hear immeasurably more, and see and hear thoughtfully - and precisely this distinguishes human beings from animals, and the higher animals from the lower. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §301) | |
| A reaction: Since most people are well equipped with eyes and ears, I take it that this phenomenon, if true, arises from the 'higher' type of person having more interest in what they experience. |
| 24076 | A morality ranks human drives and actions, for the sake of the herd, and subordinating individuals [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Whenever we encounter a morality we find an estimation and order of rank of human drives and actions. These are always the expression of the needs of a community and herd. The individual is valued only as a function of the herd. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §116) | |
| A reaction: A particularly clear summary of Nietzsche's understanding of modern morality (which he rejects). I tend to see values as what is important, but Nietzsche sees them as a ranking. Could be both. I see the individualism here as existentialist. |
| 22471 | Nietzsche thought it 'childish' to say morality isn't binding because it varies between cultures [Nietzsche, by Foot] |
| Full Idea: Nietzsche was not simply a run-of-the-mill moral relativist. He branded as 'childish' the idea that no morality can be binding because moral valuations are necessarily different among different nations. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §345) by Philippa Foot - Nietzsche's Immoralism p.146 | |
| A reaction: Relativists about knowledge and morality are inclined to take quotations from Nietzsche out of context. The existence of this database probably exacerbates such intellectual wickedness. Get a feeling for the whole thinker! |
| 2935 | No two actions are the same [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: There neither are nor can be actions which are the same. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §335) |
| 20198 | Many virtues are harmful traps, but that is why other people praise them [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Virtues like industriousness, obedience, chastity, filial piety and justice are usually harmful to those who possess them. When you have a real, whole virtue you are its victim. But your neighbour praises your virtue precisely on that account. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §021) | |
| A reaction: This is the conspiracy theory of virtue. We want people to do menial or undesirable jobs, so we dress them up as wonderful virtues, and make people feel good for possessing them. There must be some truth in this. |
| 4275 | You cannot advocate joyful wisdom while rejecting pity, because the two are complementary [Scruton on Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Pity and good cheer are complementary, ..so there is something contradictory in a philosophy that advocates joyful wisdom, while slandering pity as the enemy of the higher life. | |
| From: comment on Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882]) by Roger Scruton - Animal Rights and Wrongs p.35 | |
| A reaction: A good objection to Nietzsche. He has a rather solipsistic view of joyful exuberance etc., and fails to realise how social such things must be. In that, Nietzsche was caught in the romantic tradition of Wordsworth and co. |
| 2934 | To see one's own judgement as a universal law is selfish [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: It is selfish to experience one's own judgement as a universal law. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §335) |
| 24080 | We should give style to our character - by applying an artistic plan to its strengths and weaknesses [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: One thing is essential - 'giving style' to one's character. It is practised by the one who surveys everything that his nature offers in strengths and weaknesses, and subjects it to an artistic plan until each thing appears as art and reason. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §290) | |
| A reaction: Clearly existentialist, in its proposal to change one's own character. I invite the reader to consider applying this to themselves - and I submit that it is an impossible project. Nice thought, though. |
| 20125 | The ethical teacher exists to give purpose to what happens necessarily and without purpose [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: That what happens necessarily, spontaneously and without any purpose, may henceforth appear to be done for some purpose, and strike man as rational and an ultimate commandment, the ethical teacher comes on stage, as teacher of the purpose of existence. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §001) | |
| A reaction: This doesn't look like much of a solution to the problem of nihilism, unless the teacher plants an idea in us which endures and grows. Nietzsche's 'eternal recurrence' was supposed to be just such an idea. |
| 9306 | To ward off boredom at any cost is vulgar [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: To ward off boredom at any cost is vulgar. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §042) | |
| A reaction: Ignoring 'vulgar', this is a nice thought. Do affluent retired people now travel so much because they are terrified of boredom? What would they end up doing if they stayed at home and lived through the boredom to something else? |
| 24079 | The best life is the dangerous life [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: The secret of harvesting the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment from existence is: live dangerously! | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §283) | |
| A reaction: I treasured this quotation when I was 17, but failed to live up to it. |
| 2936 | Imagine if before each of your actions you had to accept repeating the action over and over again [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Suppose a demon were to say to you, "This life as you have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more". …Then the question in each thing, "Do you desire this once more and innumerable times more?" would lie across your actions. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §341) | |
| A reaction: If you were stuck in nihilistic indifference, this thought might not be enough to rouse you from your torpor. If all possibilities in life are boring, repetition cannot pep it up, or make it any worse. But I still love this idea! |
| 6842 | Nietzsche says facing up to the eternal return of meaninglessness is the response to nihilism [Nietzsche, by Critchley] |
| Full Idea: Nietzsche is overwhelmingly concerned with how to respond to nihilism, and he offers the concept of eternal return; the Overman is one who can affirm over and over that one is equal to meaninglessness, without turning to despair or idols. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §342) by Simon Critchley - Interview with Baggini and Stangroom p.192 | |
| A reaction: I agree with Critchley that this is not much of a recipe for ordinary people's lives, and I don't even find it very congenial for a tough-minded philosopher. We should make the best of the cards we are dealt, however feeble they may appear. |
| 2931 | God is dead, and we have killed him [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §125) |