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All the ideas for 'Positivism and Realism', 'Parerga and Paralipomena' and 'Meaning and the Moral Sciences'

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47 ideas

1. Philosophy / E. Nature of Metaphysics / 5. Metaphysics beyond Science
Metaphysics studies the inexplicable ends of explanation [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: The plummet touches the bottom of the sea now at a greater depth, now at a less, but is bound to reach it somewhere sooner or later; the study of this inexplicable devolves upon metaphysics.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], I:1)
     A reaction: This definition of metapysics contains the germ of despair about the subject. Does he hope that metaphysicians can explain what nobody else can?
1. Philosophy / E. Nature of Metaphysics / 7. Against Metaphysics
The empiricist says that metaphysics is meaningless, rather than false [Schlick]
     Full Idea: The empiricist does not say to the metaphysician 'what you say is false', but 'what you say asserts nothing at all!' He does not contradict him, but says 'I don't understand you'.
     From: Moritz Schlick (Positivism and Realism [1934], p.107), quoted by Jonathan Schaffer - On What Grounds What 1.1
     A reaction: I take metaphysics to be meaningful, but at such a high level of abstraction that it is easy to drift into vague nonsense, and incredibly hard to assess what is meant, and whether it is correct. The truths of metaphysics are not recursive.
1. Philosophy / G. Scientific Philosophy / 3. Scientism
A culture needs to admit that knowledge is more extensive than just 'science' [Putnam]
     Full Idea: The acknowledgement that the sphere of knowledge is wider than the sphere of 'science' seems to me to be a cultural necessity if we are to arrive at a sane and human view of ourselves or of science.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro)
     A reaction: A very nice remark, with which I intuitively agree, but then you are left with the problem of explaining how something can qualify as knowledge when it can't pass the stringent tests of science. How wide to we spread, and why?
'True' and 'refers' cannot be made scientically precise, but are fundamental to science [Putnam]
     Full Idea: Some non-scientific knowledge is presupposed by science; for example, I have been arguing that 'refers' and 'true' cannot be made scientifically precise; yet truth is a fundamental term in logic - a precise science.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec VI)
     A reaction: We might ask whether we 'know' what 'true' and 'refers' mean, as opposed to being able to use them. If their usage doesn't count as knowledge, then we could still end up with all actual knowledge being somehow 'scientific'.
3. Truth / A. Truth Problems / 1. Truth
'The rug is green' might be warrantedly assertible even though the rug is not green [Putnam]
     Full Idea: 'The rug is green' might be warrantedly assertible even though the rug is not green.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three)
     A reaction: The word 'warranted' seems to be ambiguous in modern philosophy. See Idea 6150. There seem to be internalist and externalist versions. It seems clear to say that a belief could be well-justified and yet false.
3. Truth / C. Correspondence Truth / 1. Correspondence Truth
We need the correspondence theory of truth to understand language and science [Putnam]
     Full Idea: A correspondence theory of truth is needed to understand how language works, and how science works.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro)
     A reaction: Putnam retreated from this position to a more pragmatic one later on, but all my sympathies are with the present view, despite being repeatedly told by modern philosophers that I am wrong. See McGinn (Idea 6085) and Searle (Idea 3508).
3. Truth / C. Correspondence Truth / 3. Correspondence Truth critique
Correspondence between concepts and unconceptualised reality is impossible [Putnam]
     Full Idea: The great nineteenth century argument against the correspondence theory of truth was that one cannot think of truth as correspondence to facts (or 'reality') because one would need to compare concepts directly with unconceptualised reality.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three)
     A reaction: Presumably the criticism was offered by idealists, who preferred a coherence theory. The defence is to say that there is a confusion here between a concept and the contents of a concept. The contents of a concept are designed to be facts.
3. Truth / F. Semantic Truth / 2. Semantic Truth
In Tarski's definition, you understand 'true' if you accept the notions of the object language [Putnam]
     Full Idea: Anyone who accepts the notions of whatever object language is in question - and this can be chosen arbitrarily - can also understand 'true' as defined by Tarski for that object language.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro)
     A reaction: Thus if we say "'snow is white' is true iff snow is white", then if you 'accept the notion' that snow is white in English, you understand what 'true' means. This seems to leave you with the meaning of 'snow is white' being its truth conditions.
Tarski has given a correct account of the formal logic of 'true', but there is more to the concept [Putnam]
     Full Idea: What Tarski has done is to give us a perfectly correct account of the formal logic of the concept 'true', but the formal logic of the concept is not all there is to the notion of truth.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro)
     A reaction: I find this refreshing. A lot of modern philosophers seem to think that truth is no longer an interesting philosophical topic, because deflationary accounts have sidelined it, but I take the concept to be at the heart of metaphysics.
Only Tarski has found a way to define 'true' [Putnam]
     Full Idea: There is only one way anyone knows how to define 'true' and that is Tarski's way.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec II.5)
     A reaction: However, Davidson wrote a paper called 'On the Folly of Trying to Define Truth', which seems to reject even Tarski. Also bear in mind Putnam's earlier remark (Idea 6265) that there is more to truth than Tarski's definition. Just take 'true' as primitive.
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 2. Realism
For me the objective thing-in-itself is the will [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Thing in itself signifies that which exists independently of our perception, that which actually is; …to Kant it was '= x'; to me it is will.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], IV:61)
     A reaction: Does he mean his own will, which is plausible since he has direct experience of it, or is he referring will in general - whatever that is?
Realism is a theory, which explains the convergence of science and the success of language [Putnam]
     Full Idea: Realism is an empirical theory; it explains the convergence of scientific theories, where earlier theories are often limiting cases of later theories (which is why theoretical terms preserve their reference); and it explains the success of language.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four)
     A reaction: I agree. Personally, I think of Plato's Theory of Forms and all religions as empirical theories. The response from anti-realists is generally to undermine confidence in the evidence which these 'empirical theories' are said to explain.
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 3. Value of Knowledge
Knowledge is not power! Ignorant people possess supreme authority [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Knowledge is power. The devil it is! One man can have a great deal of knowledge without its giving him the least power, while another possesses supreme authority but next to no knowledge.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], III:43)
     A reaction: He is referring to Bacon's famous adage. Bacon may be right about military affairs, but not about politics.
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 1. Nature of the A Priori
A priori propositions are those we could never be seriously motivated to challenge [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: A dictate of reason is the name we give to certain propositions which we hold to be true without investigation, and of which we think ourselves so firmly convinced we should be incapable of seriously testing them even if we wanted to.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], I:12)
     A reaction: This is closer to the cautious way modern thinkers are inclined to express the idea. Even Quine would be reasonably happy with this.
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 8. A Priori as Analytic
If a tautology is immune from revision, why would that make it true? [Putnam]
     Full Idea: If we held, say, 'All unmarried men are unmarried' as absolutely immune from revision, why would this make it true?
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four)
     A reaction: A very nice question. Like most American philosophers, Putnam accepts Quine's attack on the unrevisability of analytic truths. His point here is that defenders of analytic truths are probably desperate to preserve basic truths, but it won't work.
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 7. Testimony
Knowledge depends on believing others, which must be innate, as inferences are not strong enough [Putnam]
     Full Idea: Our ability to picture how people are likely to respond may well be innate; indeed, our disposition to believe what other people tell us (which is fundamental to knowledge) could hardly be an inference, as that isn’t good enough for knowledge.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec VI)
     A reaction: An interesting claim. There could be an intermediate situation, which is a hard-wired non-conscious inference. When dismantled, the 'innate' brain circuits for assessing testimony could turn out to work on logic and evidence.
Empathy may not give knowledge, but it can give plausibility or right opinion [Putnam]
     Full Idea: Empathy with others may give less than 'Knowledge', but it gives more than mere logical or physical possibility; it gives plausibility, or (to revive Platonic terminology) it provides 'right opinion'.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec VI)
     A reaction: See Ideas 174 and 2140 for Plato. Putnam is exploring areas of knowledge outside the limits of strict science. Behind this claim seems to lie the Principle of Charity (3971), but a gang of systematic liars (e.g. evil students) would be a problem case.
14. Science / D. Explanation / 1. Explanation / a. Explanation
All knowledge and explanation rests on the inexplicable [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: The fundament upon which all our knowledge and learning rests is the inexplicable. It is to this that every explanation, through few or many intermediary stages, leads.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], I:1)
     A reaction: This is obviously true, and the only question is whether it is a necessary or a contingent truth.
14. Science / D. Explanation / 4. Explanation Doubts / a. Explanation as pragmatic
You can't decide which explanations are good if you don't attend to the interest-relative aspects [Putnam]
     Full Idea: Explanation is an interest-relative notion …explanation has to be partly a pragmatic concept. To regard the 'pragmatics' of explanation as no part of the concept is to abdicate the job of figuring out what makes an explanation good.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], p. 41-2), quoted by David-Hillel Ruben - Explaining Explanation Ch 1
     A reaction: I suppose this is just obvious, depending on how far you want to take the 'interest-relative' bit. If a fool is fobbed off with a trivial explanation, there must be some non-relative criterion for assessing that.
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 2. Unconscious Mind
Half our thinking is unconscious, and we reach conclusions while unaware of premises [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: One might almost believe that half our thinking takes place unconsciously.. Usually we arrive at a conclusion without having clearly thought about the premises which lead to it.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], III:40)
     A reaction: Schopenhauer was a major pioneer of this crucial idea. I'm beginning to think it is much greater than a half.
16. Persons / F. Free Will / 6. Determinism / a. Determinism
We don't control our own thinking [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Thoughts come not when we want but when they want.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], III:37)
     A reaction: One of my favourite Nietzsche ideas originated in Schopenhauer!
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 2. Origin of Concepts / b. Empirical concepts
All of our concepts are borrowed from perceptual knowledge [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: The entire property of a concept consists in nothing more than what has been begged and borrowed from perceptual knowledge, which is the true and inexhaustible source of all insight.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], I:9)
     A reaction: Schopenhauer is usually seen as a sort of idealist, but this is a full endorsement of the empirical view of concepts, to which I largely subscribe. Note that he talks of 'knowledge', rather than of 'experience'.
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 1. Meaning
Theory of meaning presupposes theory of understanding and reference [Putnam]
     Full Idea: Theory of meaning presupposes theory of understanding and reference.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four)
     A reaction: How can you have a theory of understanding without a meaning that requires to be understood? Personally I think about the minds of small animals when pondering this, and that seems to put reference and truth at the front of the queue.
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 4. Meaning as Truth-Conditions
Truth conditions can't explain understanding a sentence, because that in turn needs explanation [Putnam]
     Full Idea: You can't treat understanding a sentence as knowing its truth conditions, because it then becomes unintelligible what that knowledge in turn consists in.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four)
     A reaction: The implication, I take it, is circularity; how can you specify truth conditions if you don't understand sentences? Putnam here agrees with Dummett that verification must be involved. Something has to be taken as axiomatic in all this.
We should reject the view that truth is prior to meaning [Putnam]
     Full Idea: I am suggesting that we reject the view that truth (based on the semantic theory) is prior to meaning.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three)
     A reaction: It is a nice question which of truth or meaning has logical priority. One might start by speculating about how and why animals think. A moth attracted to flame is probably working on truth without much that could be called 'meaning'.
19. Language / B. Reference / 1. Reference theories
How reference is specified is not what reference is [Putnam]
     Full Idea: A theory of how reference is specified isn't a theory of what reference is.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec V)
     A reaction: A simple and important point. We may achieve reference by naming, describing, grunting or pointing, but the question is, what have we achieved when we get there?
19. Language / B. Reference / 4. Descriptive Reference / b. Reference by description
The claim that scientific terms are incommensurable can be blocked if scientific terms are not descriptions [Putnam]
     Full Idea: The line of reasoning of Kuhn and Feyerabend can be blocked by arguing (as I have in various places, and as Saul Kripke has) that scientific terms are not synonymous with descriptions.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec II.2)
     A reaction: A nice clear statement of the motivation for creating the causal theory of reference. See Idea 6162. We could still go back and ask whether we could block scientific relativism by rethinking how descriptions work, instead of abandoning them.
19. Language / F. Communication / 4. Private Language
A private language could work with reference and beliefs, and wouldn't need meaning [Putnam]
     Full Idea: A language made up and used by a being who belonged to no community would have no need for such a concept as the 'meaning' of a term. To state the reference of each term and what the language speaker believes is to tell the whole story.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three)
     A reaction: A subtle response to Wittgenstein's claim (e.g. Ideas 4152,4158), but I am not sure what Putnam means. I would have thought that beliefs had to be embodied in propositions. They may not need 'meaning' quite as urgently as sentences, but still…
19. Language / F. Communication / 6. Interpreting Language / b. Indeterminate translation
The correct translation is the one that explains the speaker's behaviour [Putnam]
     Full Idea: What it is to be a correct translation is to be the translation that best explains the behaviour of the speaker.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec III)
     A reaction: This seems fairly close to Quine, but rather puzzlingly uses the word 'correct'. If our criteria of translation are purely behavioural, there is no way we can be correct after one word ('gavagai'), so at what point does it become 'correct'?
Language maps the world in many ways (because it maps onto other languages in many ways) [Putnam]
     Full Idea: We could say that the language has more than one correct way of being mapped onto the world (it must, since it has more than one way of being correctly mapped onto a language which is itself correctly mapped onto the world).
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four)
     A reaction: This spells out nicely the significance of Quine's 'indeterminacy of translation'. Others have pointed out that the fact that language maps onto world in many ways need not be anti-realist; the world is endless, and language is limited.
19. Language / F. Communication / 6. Interpreting Language / c. Principle of charity
You can't say 'most speaker's beliefs are true'; in some areas this is not so, and you can't count beliefs [Putnam]
     Full Idea: The maxim that 'most of a speaker's beliefs are true' as an a priori principle governing radical translation seems to me to go too far; first, I don't know how to count beliefs; second, most people's beliefs on some topics (philosophy) are probably false.
     From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three)
     A reaction: Putnam prefers a pragmatic view, where charity is applicable if behaviour is involved. Philosophy is too purely theoretical. The extent to which Charity should apply in philosophy seminars is a nice question, which all students should test in practice.
21. Aesthetics / A. Aesthetic Experience / 1. Aesthetics
Aesthetics concerns how we can take pleasure in an object, with no reference to the will [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: The central problem of aesthetics is how satisfaction with and pleasure in an object are possible without any reference thereof to our willing.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], II:415), quoted by Christopher Janaway - Schopenhauer 6 'Aesthetic'
     A reaction: This does seem a good distinction. We can divide pleasures into willed and unwilled. Compare thinking that some remote stranger (in a photograph) is very beautiful, with falling in love with someone.
21. Aesthetics / A. Aesthetic Experience / 4. Beauty
The beautiful is a perception of Plato's Forms, which eliminates the will [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: In the beautiful we always perceive the intrinsic and primary form of animate and inanimate nature, that is to say Plato's Ideas thereof. …When an aesthetic perception occurs the will completely vanishes from consciousness.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], XIX:205)
     A reaction: An essential Schopenauer idea. Iris Murdoch said something similar.
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / e. Human nature
Man is essentially a dreadful wild animal [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Man is at bottom a dreadful wild animal.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], VIII:114)
     A reaction: As an example he cites the slave owners in the United States.
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 3. Pleasure / c. Value of pleasure
Pleasure is weaker, and pain stronger, than we expect [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: As a rule we find pleasure much less pleasurable, pain much more painful than we expected.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], XII:149)
     A reaction: Never go on holiday with Schopenhauer. This is more accurate about pain, I think.
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / e. Character
A man's character can be learned from a single characteristic action [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: As a botanist can recognise the whole plant from one leaf, …so an accurate knowledge of a man's character can be arrived at from a single characteristic action.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], VIII:118)
     A reaction: Very true. Great novelists specialise in such observations. One word can reveal a character, as well as one action.
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 3. Virtues / a. Virtues
The five Chinese virtues: pity, justice, politeness, wisdom, honesty [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: The Chinese name five cardinal virtues: pity, justice, politeness, wisdom and honesty.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], VIII:110)
     A reaction: I like politeness being on the list, though it seems rather superficial to be a virtue of character. Respect would be better.
Buddhists wisely start with the cardinal vices [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Because of their profounder ethical and metaphysical insight, the Buddhists start not with the cardinal virtues but with cardinal vices, …which are lust, sloth, wrath and avarice (and maybe hatred).
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], VIII:110)
     A reaction: This may be right. Our lives are affected much more by the vices of others than by their virtues, and most virtuous behaviour aims at rectifying the bad effects of other people's vices.
23. Ethics / F. Existentialism / 4. Boredom
Boredom is only felt by those clever enough to need activity [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Only in the cleverest animals such as dogs and apes does the need for activity, and with that boredom, make itself felt.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], III:50)
     A reaction: But it is much more frequently young creatures, of almost any kind, that seek constant activity, and get continually restless. The most active adults need not be the cleverest.
Human life is a mistake, shown by boredom, which is direct awareness of the fact [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Human life must be some kind of mistake. ...Boredom is a direct proof that existence is in itself valueless, for boredom is nothing other than the sensation of the emptiness of existence.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], XI:146)
     A reaction: I think it is a good advertisement for existentialism that it makes something more out of boredom than Schopenhauer does.
24. Political Theory / B. Nature of a State / 1. Purpose of a State
The state only exists to defend citizens, from exterior threats, and from one another [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: The state is essentially no more than an institution for the protection of the whole against attacks from without, and the protection of its individual members from attacks by one another.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], IX:123)
     A reaction: He then has a swipe at Hegel for his inflated idea of the importance of the state. Schopenhauer is close to Hobbes on this one.
25. Social Practice / A. Freedoms / 1. Slavery
Poverty and slavery are virtually two words for the same thing [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Poverty and slavery are only two forms - on might almost say two words for - the same thing, the essence of which is that a man's energies are expended for the most part not on his own behalf but on that of others.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], IX:125)
     A reaction: The modern world is full of people who righteously despise slavery, but think only of the poor that it serves them right.
25. Social Practice / A. Freedoms / 3. Free speech
The freedom of the press to sell poison outweighs its usefulness [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Freedom of the press must be regarded as a permit to sell poison. …I very much fear, therefore, that the dangers of press freedom outweigh its usefulness.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], IX:127)
     A reaction: On the whole the modern world disagrees with this view, but watching the popular press in Britain in the last twenty years has made me sympathise with Schopenhauer.
25. Social Practice / F. Life Issues / 4. Suicide
If suicide was quick and easy, most people would have done it by now [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Perhaps there is no one alive who would not already have put an end to his life if this end were something purely negative, a sudden cessation of existence.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], XIII:158)
     A reaction: Nonsense, on the whole, but it is a nice question how many people would do it if it only took a painless instant.
25. Social Practice / F. Life Issues / 5. Sexual Morality
Would humanity still exist if sex wasn't both desired and pleasurable? [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: If the act of procreation were neither the outcome of a desire nor accompanied by feelings of pleasure, but a matter to be decided on the basis of purely rational considerations, is it likely the human race would still exist?
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], XII:156)
     A reaction: This is almost certainly correct in the modern world. In tougher economic circumstances people seem desperate to have children who will help them survive.
29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 1. Religious Commitment / a. Religious Belief
Only religion introduces serious issues to uneducated people [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Religion is the only means of introducing some notion of the high significance of life into the uncultivated heads of the masses.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], XV:174)
     A reaction: Cf Philip Larkin's poem 'Church Going'. On the whole Schopenhauer didn't actually believe that our lives had any 'high significance'.
29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 3. Problem of Evil / a. Problem of Evil
The Creator created the possibilities for worlds, so should have made a better one than this possible [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: The Creator created not only the world, but also created possibility itself; therefore he should have created the possibility of a better world than this one.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], XII:156)
     A reaction: This is explicitly a response to Leibniz's claim that the Creator selected the best of all possible worlds from the available options. The Euthyphro Question hovers here: must the Creator accept what is possible (the platonic view), or create possibility?