7 ideas
| 6012 | We must choose in which of the virtues we wish to excel [Panaetius] |
| Full Idea: Humans have four roles in life, of which the fourth involves choices, of career, and of the virtue in which one wishes to excel. | |
| From: Panaetius (fragments/reports [c.145 BCE]), quoted by Elizabeth Asmis - Panaetius | |
| A reaction: Panaetius strikes me as exceptionally wise. A big gap in Aristotle is the fact that we cannot excel in all virtues, and that therefore some choice is required. By what criteria? We have the Gauguin problem (excel in one, disgraceful in the others). |
| 6013 | Panaetius said we should live according to our natural starting-points [Panaetius, by Asmis] |
| Full Idea: Panaetius reformulated the Stoic goal as living in accordance with the starting-points given to us by nature. | |
| From: report of Panaetius (fragments/reports [c.145 BCE]) by Elizabeth Asmis - Panaetius | |
| A reaction: This sounds remarkably like the substitution of meritocratic equality of opportunity for communistic actual equality. In other words, it doesn't sound very Stoic. 'Live according to nature' implies more restraint than this ambitious version. |
| 6014 | Panaetius identified courage with great-mindedness, preferring civic courage to military [Panaetius, by Asmis] |
| Full Idea: Panaetius recast the virtue of courage as 'greatmindedness' (Aristotle's paramount virtue), he demoted military valour and gave priority to courage displayed in civic life. | |
| From: report of Panaetius (fragments/reports [c.145 BCE]) by Elizabeth Asmis - Panaetius | |
| A reaction: I find this very appealing, as I am increasingly horrified by our denigration of the people who implement our democracy for us. We urgently need to get back to the Greek idea of civic virtue, and this idea of Panaetius should be widely promulgated. |
| 20646 | Helmholtz used 'energy' to mathematically link heat, light, electricity and magnetism [Helmholtz, by Watson] |
| Full Idea: Helmholtz provided the requisite mathematical formulation linking heat, light, electricity and magnetism, by treating these phenomena as different manifestations of 'energy'. | |
| From: report of Hermann von Helmholtz (On the Conservation of Force [1847]) by Peter Watson - Convergence 01 'Human' | |
| A reaction: I'm increasingly struck by the neglect by philosophers of nature of these amazing developments in 19th century physics, because they prefer the excitement of the latest nuclear physics. There is more philosophical interest in the earlier stages. |
| 20973 | All forces conserve the sum of kinetic and potential energy [Helmholtz, by Papineau] |
| Full Idea: Helmholtz crucially asserted that all forces conserve the sum of kinetic and potential energy; superficially non-conservative forces like friction are simply macroscopic manifestations of more fundamental forces conserving energy at the micro-level. | |
| From: report of Hermann von Helmholtz (On the Conservation of Force [1847]) by David Papineau - Thinking about Consciousness App 4.3 | |
| A reaction: Friction had been a problem case, because it appeared not to conserve energy when it slowed movement down. |
| 6011 | There is a remote first god (the Good), and a second god who organises the material world [Numenius, by O'Meara] |
| Full Idea: Numenius argues that material reality depends on intelligible being, which depends on a first god - the Good - which is difficult to grasp, but which inspires a second god to imitate it, turning to matter and organizing it as the world. | |
| From: report of Numenius (fragments/reports [c.160]) by Dominic J. O'Meara - Numenius | |
| A reaction: The interaction problem comes either between the two gods, or between the second god and the world. The argument may have failed to catch on for long when people scented an infinite regress lurking in the middle of it. |
| 5888 | Souls are born, since they are sensitive and inherited, so they must perish [Panaetius, by Cicero] |
| Full Idea: Panaetius says that whatever is born must perish, and souls are clearly born, as shown by the resemblance of children to their parents in disposition as well as body; also, anything sensible of pain is susceptible to sickness, and hence perishes. | |
| From: report of Panaetius (fragments/reports [c.145 BCE]) by M. Tullius Cicero - Tusculan Disputations I.xxxii | |
| A reaction: These seem to be rather good arguments. If we actually observe what someone's soul is like (through character) it seems rooted in a family and culture, and it certainly seems susceptible to disease. An empirical approach. |