21 ideas
21793 | Genuine truth is the resolution of the highest contradiction [Hegel] |
Full Idea: The highest truth, truth as such, is the resolution of the highest opposition and contradiction. | |
From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826], I: 99), quoted by Stephen Houlgate - An Introduction to Hegel 09 'Art' | |
A reaction: Uneasy about the word 'highest', and the general Hegelian dream of 'resolving' contradictions, rather than just eliminating at least one component of them. No one else uses the word 'truth' like this. I suppose this Truth has a capital 'T'. |
21795 | What I hold true must also be part of my feelings and character [Hegel] |
Full Idea: Whatever I hold as true, whatever ought to be valid for me, must also be in my feeling, must belong to my being and character. | |
From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826], I: 97), quoted by Stephen Houlgate - An Introduction to Hegel 09 'Philosophy' | |
A reaction: I can see that truths do tend to become part of our character, but not that they ought to do so. I suppose I try to live my life enmeshed in the many truths which I have personally selected from the maelstrom of possibilities that engulf us. |
17884 | Mathematical set theory has many plausible stopping points, such as finitism, and predicativism [Koellner] |
Full Idea: There are many coherent stopping points in the hierarchy of increasingly strong mathematical systems, starting with strict finitism, and moving up through predicativism to the higher reaches of set theory. | |
From: Peter Koellner (On the Question of Absolute Undecidability [2006], Intro) |
17893 | 'Reflection principles' say the whole truth about sets can't be captured [Koellner] |
Full Idea: Roughly speaking, 'reflection principles' assert that anything true in V [the set hierarchy] falls short of characterising V in that it is true within some earlier level. | |
From: Peter Koellner (On the Question of Absolute Undecidability [2006], 2.1) |
17894 | We have no argument to show a statement is absolutely undecidable [Koellner] |
Full Idea: There is at present no solid argument to the effect that a given statement is absolutely undecidable. | |
From: Peter Koellner (On the Question of Absolute Undecidability [2006], 5.3) |
17890 | There are at least eleven types of large cardinal, of increasing logical strength [Koellner] |
Full Idea: Some of the standard large cardinals (in order of increasing (logical) strength) are: inaccessible, Mahlo, weakly compact, indescribable, Erdös, measurable, strong, Wodin, supercompact, huge etc. (...and ineffable). | |
From: Peter Koellner (On the Question of Absolute Undecidability [2006], 1.4) | |
A reaction: [I don't understand how cardinals can have 'logical strength', but I pass it on anyway] |
17887 | PA is consistent as far as we can accept, and we expand axioms to overcome limitations [Koellner] |
Full Idea: To the extent that we are justified in accepting Peano Arithmetic we are justified in accepting its consistency, and so we know how to expand the axiom system so as to overcome the limitation [of Gödel's Second Theorem]. | |
From: Peter Koellner (On the Question of Absolute Undecidability [2006], 1.1) | |
A reaction: Each expansion brings a limitation, but then you can expand again. |
17891 | Arithmetical undecidability is always settled at the next stage up [Koellner] |
Full Idea: The arithmetical instances of undecidability that arise at one stage of the hierarchy are settled at the next. | |
From: Peter Koellner (On the Question of Absolute Undecidability [2006], 1.4) |
22868 | The value and truth of knowledge are measured by success in activity [Dewey] |
Full Idea: What measures knowledge's value, its correctness and truth, is the degree of its availability for conducting to a successful issue the activities of living beings. | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 4:180), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 2 'Critique' | |
A reaction: Note that this is the measure of truth, not the nature of truth (which James seemed to believe). Dewey gives us a clear and perfect statement of the pragmatic view of knowledge. I don't agree with it. |
22865 | Habits constitute the self [Dewey] |
Full Idea: All habits are demands for certain kinds of activity; and they constitute the self. | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 14:22), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 1 'Acts' | |
A reaction: Not an idea I have encountered elsewhere. He emphasises that habits are not repeated actions, but are dispositions. I'm not clear whether these habits must be conscious. |
18549 | Nineteenth century aesthetics focused on art rather than nature (thanks to Hegel) [Hegel, by Scruton] |
Full Idea: Only In the course of the nineteenth century, and in the wake of Hegel's posthumously published lectures on aesthetics, did the topic of art come to replace that of natural beauty as the core subject-matter of aesthetics. | |
From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826], 5) by Roger Scruton - Beauty: a very short introduction |
22043 | Hegel largely ignores aesthetic pleasure, taste and beauty, and focuses on the meaning of artworks [Hegel, by Pinkard] |
Full Idea: Unlike his predecessors (including Kant), Hegel does not focus on aesthetic pleasure, nor on good taste, nor even on the nature and criteria for beauty. Instead he focuses on the meaning of artworks and their role in forming mankind's self-consciousness. | |
From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 11 | |
A reaction: Personally I dislike over-intellectualising art. The aim of a work of art is to give a certain experience, not to generate an ensuing sequence of theorising. I doubt whether Vermeer had any 'meaning' in mind in his obsessive work. |
22042 | Natural beauty is unimportant, because it doesn't show human freedom [Hegel, by Pinkard] |
Full Idea: Hegel thinks that natural beauty is of no real significance since it cannot display our freedom to us; nature per se is meaningless. | |
From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 11 | |
A reaction: Presumably freedom is in the creation, and so creativity is what matters in aesthetics. But what are the criteria of good creativity? |
20413 | For Hegel the importance of art concerns the culture, not the individual [Hegel, by Eldridge] |
Full Idea: Hegel locates the significance of art in its role in cultural life in general, not in relation to the psychological needs of individuals. | |
From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826]) by Richard Eldridge - G.W.F. Hegel (aesthetics) 1 | |
A reaction: I'm beginning to see that art is a wonderful focus and test case for political attitudes. Roughly, liberalism focuses on individual responses, but more societal views (from right and left) see it in terms of role in the community. Which are you? |
20394 | The purpose of art is to reveal to Spirit its own nature [Hegel, by Davies,S] |
Full Idea: According to Hegel, the goal of art was to serve as a phase in a process by which Spirit would come to understand its own nature. | |
From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826]) by Stephen Davies - The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) 2.7 | |
A reaction: I try very hard to understand ideas like this. Really really hard. However, since I see little sign of 'Spirit' really understanding its own nature, I'm guessing that the project is not going well. |
21794 | The main purpose of art is to express the unity of human life [Hegel] |
Full Idea: Art's primary function, for Hegel, is to give expression to the unity and wholeness of life - especially human life - that the contingencies of everyday existence frequently conceal. | |
From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826]), quoted by Stephen Houlgate - An Introduction to Hegel 09 'Beauty' | |
A reaction: I don't find the view that human life is 'unified' and 'whole' vary illuminating, and I have no objection to art which reflects the fragmentary and unstable aspects of life. I suspect Hegel would just prefer it if life were a unity. |
20415 | Art forms a bridge between the sensuous world and the world of pure thought [Hegel] |
Full Idea: Spirit generates out of itself works of fine art as the first reconciling middle term between pure thought and what is merely external, sensuous and transient - between finite natural reality and the infinite freedom of conceptual thinking. | |
From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on Aesthetics [1826], p.8), quoted by Richard Eldridge - G.W.F. Hegel (aesthetics) | |
A reaction: This apparently says that there is necessarily an intellectual and conceptual component in art. This means little to me. Does he include portraits? Dutch domestic scenes? Would photography qualify? |
22871 | The good people are those who improve; the bad are those who deteriorate [Dewey] |
Full Idea: The bad man is the man who no matter how good he has been is beginning to deteriorate, to grow less good. The good man is the man who no matter how morally unworthy he has been is moving to become better. | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 12:181), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 3 'Reconstruct' | |
A reaction: Although a slightly improving rat doesn't sound as good as a slightly deteriorating saint, I have some sympathy with this thought. The desire to improve seems to be right at the heart of what makes good character. |
22876 | Democracy is the development of human nature when it shares in the running of communal activities [Dewey] |
Full Idea: Democracy is but a name for the fact that human nature is developed only when its elements take part in directing things which are common, things for the sake of which men and women form groups. | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 12:199), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 4 'Democracy' | |
A reaction: It is hard to prove that human nature develops when it particpates in groups. If people are excluded from power, their loyalty tends to switch to sub-groups, such as friends in a pub, or a football team. Powerless nationalists baffle me. |
22875 | Democracy is not just a form of government; it is a mode of shared living [Dewey] |
Full Idea: A democracy is more than a form of government; it is primarily a mode of associated living, of conjoint communicated experience | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 9:93), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 4 'Democracy' | |
A reaction: This precisely pinpoints the heart of the culture wars in 2021. A huge swathe of western populations believe in Dewey's idea, but a core of wealthy right-wingers and their servants only see democracy as the mechanism for obtaining power. |
22874 | Individuality is only developed within groups [Dewey] |
Full Idea: Only in social groups does a person have a chance to develop individuality. | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 15:176), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 4 'Individuals' | |
A reaction: This is a criticism of both Rawls and Nozick. Rawls's initial choosers don't consult, or have much social background. Nozick's property owners ignore everything except contracts. |