Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Through the Looking Glass', 'fragments/reports' and 'Intro to Oxford Hndbk of Metaphysics'

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5 ideas

1. Philosophy / E. Nature of Metaphysics / 6. Metaphysics as Conceptual

9217	Modern empirical metaphysics focuses on ontological commitments of discourse, or on presuppositions [Loux/Zimmerman]
	Full Idea: The empiricist revival of metaphysics came with Quine, who focused on ontological commitments associated with accepting a body of discourse, and Strawson, asking about the presuppositions of our conceptual practices.
	From: M Loux / D Zimmerman (Intro to Oxford Hndbk of Metaphysics [2003])
	A reaction: I find myself preferring the British approach. I can discourse about things without ontological commitment, and utter truths about non-existent things. I really yearn, though, for the third way - actually reasoning towards knowing what's out there.

2. Reason / C. Styles of Reason / 1. Dialectic

20768	Like spiderswebs, dialectical arguments are clever but useless [Ariston, by Diog. Laertius]
	Full Idea: He said that dialectical arguments were like spiderswebs: although they seem to indicate craftsmanlike skill, they are useless.
	From: report of Ariston (fragments/reports [c.250 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.161
	A reaction: Useful for the spider, but useless to Ariston.

7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 3. Being / e. Being and nothing

21982	I only wish I had such eyes as to see Nobody! It's as much as I can do to see real people. [Carroll,L]
	Full Idea: "I see nobody on the road," said Alice. - "I only wish I had such eyes," the King remarked. ..."To be able to see Nobody! ...Why, it's as much as I can do to see real people."
	From: Lewis Carroll (C.Dodgson) (Through the Looking Glass [1886], p.189), quoted by A.W. Moore - The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics 07.7
	A reaction: [Moore quotes this, inevitably, in a chapter on Hegel] This may be a better candidate for the birth of philosophy of language than Frege's Groundwork.

23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / f. The Mean

3049	The chief good is indifference to what lies midway between virtue and vice [Ariston, by Diog. Laertius]
	Full Idea: The chief good is to live in perfect indifference to all those things which are of an intermediate character between virtue and vice.
	From: report of Ariston (fragments/reports [c.250 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.2.1

23. Ethics / D. Deontological Ethics / 1. Deontology

3549	Ariston says rules are useless for the virtuous and the non-virtuous [Ariston, by Annas]
	Full Idea: Ariston says that rules are useless if you are virtuous, and useless if you are not.
	From: report of Ariston (fragments/reports [c.250 BCE]) by Julia Annas - The Morality of Happiness 2.4