5 ideas
| 17962 | The truth-maker principle is that every truth has a sufficient truth-maker [Forrest] |
| Full Idea: Item x is said to be a sufficient truth-maker for truth-bearer p just in case necessarily if x exists then p is true. ...Every truth has a sufficient truth-maker. Hence, I take it, the sum of all sufficient truth-makers is a universal truth-maker. | |
| From: Peter Forrest (General Facts,Phys Necessity, and Metaph of Time [2006], 1) | |
| A reaction: Note that it is not 'necessary', because something else might make p true instead. |
| 20575 | Socialist economics needs a very strong central power, virtually leading to slavery [Hayek, by Oksala] |
| Full Idea: Hayek argues that socialist economic equality can only be effectively put into practice by a strong, dictatorial government. Planning has to be imposed by force, and centralised economic power creates a dependency scarcely distingishable from slavery. | |
| From: report of F.A. Hayek (The Road to Serfdom [1944]) by Johanna Oksala - Political Philosophy: all that matters Ch.7 | |
| A reaction: I don't see much sign of the post-war British Labour government being anything like this, even though they nationalised the railways and introduce a national health service. Hayek was mesmerised by Russia. |
| 22599 | Hayek was a liberal, but mainly concerned with market freedom [Hayek, by Dunt] |
| Full Idea: Hayek was a liberal (rather than a conservative), …but the individual liberty he cared about was not diversity or freedom of thought. It was freedom to operate in the market. | |
| From: report of F.A. Hayek (The Road to Serfdom [1944]) by Ian Dunt - How to be a Liberal 7 | |
| A reaction: There seems to have been a drift from obsession with freedom to participate in the market, towards the less plausible idea that market forces can solve everything. I once met someone who was convinced the market could solve environmental problems. |
| 22600 | Impeding the market is likely to lead to extensive state control [Hayek] |
| Full Idea: Once the free working of the market is impeded beyond a certain degree, the planner will be forced to extend his controls until they become all comprehensive. | |
| From: F.A. Hayek (The Road to Serfdom [1944]), quoted by Ian Dunt - How to be a Liberal 7 | |
| A reaction: Hayek was terrified of totalitarianism (quite reasonably), but fascism and communism don't seem to have arisen in the way he describes. I'm not clear why sensible intervention in the market should slide down into nightmare. |
| 7294 | No crime and no punishment without a law [Roman law] |
| Full Idea: An ancient principle of Roman law states, nullum crimen et nulla poene sine lege, - there is no crime and no punishment without a law. | |
| From: [Roman law] (Roman Law [c.100]), quoted by A.C. Grayling - Among the Dead Cities Ch.6 | |
| A reaction: That there is no 'punishment' without law seems the basis of civilization. Suppose a strong person imposed firm punishment in order to forestall more brutal revenge by others? What motivates the creation of criminal laws? |