9 ideas
16078 | Clay is intrinsically and atomically the same as statue (and that lacks 'modal properties') [Rudder Baker] |
Full Idea: Arguments for statue being the clay are: that the clay is intrinsically like the statue, that the clay has the same atoms as the statue', that objects don't have modal properties such as being necessarily F, and the reference of 'property' changes. | |
From: Lynne Rudder Baker (Why Constitution is not Identity [1997], II) | |
A reaction: [my summary of the arguments she identifies - see text for details] Rudder Baker attempts to refute all four of these arguments, in defence of constitution as different from identity. |
16077 | The clay is not a statue - it borrows that property from the statue it constitutes [Rudder Baker] |
Full Idea: I argue that a lump of clay borrows the property of being a statue from the statue. The lump is a statue because, and only because, there is something that the lump constitutes that is a statue. | |
From: Lynne Rudder Baker (Why Constitution is not Identity [1997], n9) | |
A reaction: It is skating on very thin metaphysical ice to introduce the concept of 'borrowing' a property. I've spent the last ten minutes trying to 'borrow' some properties, but without luck. |
16080 | Is it possible for two things that are identical to become two separate things? [Rudder Baker] |
Full Idea: A strong intuition shared by many philosophers is that some things that are in fact identical might not have been identical. | |
From: Lynne Rudder Baker (Why Constitution is not Identity [1997], IV) | |
A reaction: This flies in the face of the Kripkean view that if Hesperus=Phosphorus then the identity is necessary. I don't think I have an intuition that some given thing might have been two things - indeed the thought seems totally weird. Amoeba? Statue/clay? |
16076 | Constitution is not identity, as consideration of essential predicates shows [Rudder Baker] |
Full Idea: I want to resuscitate an essentialist argument against the view that constitution is identity, of the form 'x is essentially F, y is not essentially F, so x is not y'. | |
From: Lynne Rudder Baker (Why Constitution is not Identity [1997], Intro) | |
A reaction: The point is that x might be essentially F and y only accidentally F. Thus a statue is essentially so, but a lump if clay is not essentially a statue. Another case where 'necessary' would do instead of 'essentially'. |
16081 | The constitution view gives a unified account of the relation of persons/bodies, statues/bronze etc [Rudder Baker] |
Full Idea: Constitution-without-identity is superior to constitution-as-identity in that it provides a unified view of the relation between persons and bodies, statues and pieces of bronze, and so on. | |
From: Lynne Rudder Baker (Why Constitution is not Identity [1997], IV) | |
A reaction: I have a problem with the intrinsic dualism of this whole picture. Clay needs shape, statues need matter - there aren't two 'things' here which have a 'relation'. |
16082 | Statues essentially have relational properties lacked by lumps [Rudder Baker] |
Full Idea: The statue has relational properties which the lump of clay does not have essentially. | |
From: Lynne Rudder Baker (Why Constitution is not Identity [1997], V) | |
A reaction: She has in mind relations to the community of artistic life. I don't think this is convincing. Is something only a statue if it is validated by an artistic community? That sounds like relative identity, which she doesn't like. |
20594 | Choosers in the 'original position' have been stripped of most human characteristics [Sandel, by Tuckness/Wolf] |
Full Idea: Sandel argues that people in the 'original position' have been stripped of everything that makes them recognisably human: their conceptions of the good, their nationality, family membership, religion, friendships and past histories. | |
From: report of Michael J. Sandel (Liberalism and the Limits of Justice [1982]) by Tuckness,A/Wolf,C - This is Political Philosophy 4 'Communitarian' | |
A reaction: This draws attention to what a pure Enlightenment rational project Rawls is pursuing, in the spirit if Kant's ethics. Choosers in the original position become identical, and thus choose a homogeneous society. |
21120 | The self is 'unencumbered' if it can abandon its roles and commitments without losing identity [Sandel, by Shorten] |
Full Idea: Sandel says liberals are committed to the 'unencumbered self', ..when it has no roles, commitments or projects that are 'so essential that turning away from them would call into question the person I am'. | |
From: report of Michael J. Sandel (Liberalism and the Limits of Justice [1982], p.86) by Andrew Shorten - Contemporary Political Theory 02 | |
A reaction: This is a very penetrating criticism of liberalism. The liberal self that makes social and legal contracts and exercises basic political rights is not far from being a robot. It has the minimum needed to join a society. Belonging is quite different. |
8592 | Empty space is measurable in ways in which empty time necessarily is not [Bennett, by Shoemaker] |
Full Idea: Because of the multidimensionality of space and unidimensionality of time, empty space is measurable in ways in which empty time necessarily is not. | |
From: report of Jonathan Bennett (Kant's Analytic [1966], p.175) by Sydney Shoemaker - Time Without Change p.49 n4 | |
A reaction: An interesting observation, which could have been used by Samuel Clarke in his attempts to prove absolute space to Leibniz. The point does not prove absolute space, of course, but it seems to make a difference. |