|
14665
|
We can call the quality of Plato 'Platonity', and say it is a quality which only he possesses [Boethius]
|
|
Full Idea:
Let the incommunicable property of Plato be called 'Platonity'. For we can call this quality 'Platonity' by a fabricated word, in the way in which we call the quality of man 'humanity'. Therefore this Platonity is one man's alone - Plato's.
|
|
From:
Boethius (Librium de interpretatione editio secunda [c.516], PL64 462d), quoted by Alvin Plantinga - Actualism and Possible Worlds 5
|
|
A reaction:
Plantinga uses this idea to reinstate the old notion of a haecceity, to bestow unshakable identity on things. My interest in the quotation is that the most shocking confusions about properties arose long before the invention of set theory.
|
|
7903
|
The six perfections are giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom [Nagarjuna]
|
|
Full Idea:
The six perfections are of giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom.
|
|
From:
Nagarjuna (Mahaprajnaparamitashastra [c.120], 88)
|
|
A reaction:
What is 'morality', if giving is not part of it? I like patience and vigour being two of the virtues, which immediately implies an Aristotelian mean (which is always what is 'appropriate').
|
|
21783
|
State slavery is a phase of education, moving towards a full culture [Hegel]
|
|
Full Idea:
Because slavery exists in states, it is a phase of advance from the merely isolated sensual existence - a phase of education - a mode of becoming participant in a higher morality and the culture connected with it.
|
|
From:
Georg W.F.Hegel (The Philosophy of History [1840], p.98), quoted by Stephen Houlgate - An Introduction to Hegel 08 'Rights'
|
|
A reaction:
[He adds that slavery should be removed slowly, not suddenly] A nicely provocative thought. Is it better to participate in something grand (like pyramid building) as a slave, or drift in dull isolation? How long should this 'phase' last?
|