Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Letters to Edward Stillingfleet', 'When Does a Life Begin?' and 'On Motion'

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6 ideas

9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 3. Individual Essences

15990	Every individual thing which exists has an essence, which is its internal constitution [Locke]
	Full Idea: I take essences to be in everything that internal constitution or frame for the modification of substance, which God in his wisdom gives to every particular creature, when he gives it a being; and such essences I grant there are in all things that exist.
	From: John Locke (Letters to Edward Stillingfleet [1695], Letter 1), quoted by Simon Blackburn - Quasi-Realism no Fictionalism
	A reaction: This is the clearest statement I have found of Locke's commitment to essences, for all his doubts about whether we can know such things. Alexander says (ch.13) Locke was reacting against scholastic essence, as pertaining to species.

11. Knowledge Aims / B. Certain Knowledge / 1. Certainty

15994	If it is knowledge, it is certain; if it isn't certain, it isn't knowledge [Locke]
	Full Idea: What reaches to knowledge, I think may be called certainty; and what comes short of certainty, I think cannot be knowledge.
	From: John Locke (Letters to Edward Stillingfleet [1695], Letter 2), quoted by Simon Blackburn - Quasi-Realism no Fictionalism
	A reaction: I much prefer that fallibilist approach offered by the pragmatists. Knowledge is well-supported belief which seems (and is agreed) to be true, but there is a small shadow of doubt hanging over all of it.

25. Social Practice / F. Life Issues / 3. Abortion

4054	I may exist before I become a person, just as I exist before I become an adult [Lockwood]
	Full Idea: It makes perfectly good sense to say that I existed before I became a person, just as I existed before I became an adult, or a philosopher.
	From: Michael Lockwood (When Does a Life Begin? [1985], p.13)
	A reaction: The word 'I' needs thought here. I was once a non-adult, but was I ever a non-person? 'Person' is not a clear concept, despite what many philosophers since Locke may think.

4056	If the soul is held to leave the body at brain-death, it should arrive at the time of brain-creation [Lockwood]
	Full Idea: Any Christian who feels that body and soul go their separate ways at brain death ought in consistency to hold that they come together only at the point when whatever is destroyed at brain death first came into being.
	From: Michael Lockwood (When Does a Life Begin? [1985], p.24)
	A reaction: Hence Christians probably focus less on brain-death than do doctors and the rest of us.

4055	It isn't obviously wicked to destroy a potential human being (e.g. an ununited egg and sperm) [Lockwood]
	Full Idea: A week-old embryo without a brain may be a potential human being, but so are a sperm and an ovum that are about to meet in a dish, and it wouldn't be wicked to keep those apart.
	From: Michael Lockwood (When Does a Life Begin? [1985], p.19)
	A reaction: Sounds fine, but it may be a slippery slope. Is it acceptable to deny a place at music school to a potentially great musician?

27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 1. Relativity / a. Special relativity

12709	Motion is not absolute, but consists in relation [Leibniz]
	Full Idea: In reality motion is not something absolute, but consists in relation.
	From: Gottfried Leibniz (On Motion [1677], A6.4.1968), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 3
	A reaction: It is often thought that motion being relative was invented by Einstein, but Leibniz wholeheartedly embraced 'Galilean relativity', and refused to even consider any absolute concept of motion. Acceleration is a bit trickier than velocity.