8251
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The logical space of reasons is a natural phenomenon, and it is the realm of freedom [McDowell]
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Full Idea:
The logical space of reasons is just part of the logical space of nature. ...And, in a Kantian slogan, the space of reasons is the realm of freedom.
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From:
John McDowell (Mind and World [1994], Intro 7)
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A reaction:
[second half on p.5] This is a modern have-your-cake-and-eat-it view of which I am becoming very suspicious. The modern Kantians (Davidson, Nagel, McDowell) are struggling to naturalise free will, but it won't work. Just dump it!
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21982
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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]
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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."
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From:
Lewis Carroll (C.Dodgson) (Through the Looking Glass [1886], p.189), quoted by A.W. Moore - The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics 07.7
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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.
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19092
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There is no pure Given, but it is cultured, rather than entirely relative [McDowell, by Macbeth]
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Full Idea:
McDowell argues that the Myth of the Given shows not that there is no content to a concept that is not a matter of its inferential relations to other concepts but only that awareness of the sort that we enjoy ...is acquired in the course of acculturation.
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From:
report of John McDowell (Mind and World [1994]) by Danielle Macbeth - Pragmatism and Objective Truth p.185
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A reaction:
The first view is of Wilfred Sellars, who derives pragmatic relativism from his rejection of the Myth. This idea is helpful is seeing why McDowell has a good proposal. As I look out of my window, my immediate experience seems 'cultured'.
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7845
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When we need to do something, we depute an inner servant to remind us of it [Proust]
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Full Idea:
Whenever we have something definite to do at a given moment, we depute a certain person inside us who is accustomed to that sort of duty to keep an eye on the clock and warn us of the time. This inner servant reminded me that Albertine was coming soon.
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From:
Marcel Proust (Remembrance of Things Past [1922], Cities.2.1)
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A reaction:
I think Proust is wrong that we 'depute' this servant. I think it comes as a built-in feature, and the servant could never be abandoned or sacked, no matter how poor the service. Each of us is a team, which includes servants.
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