67 ideas
20186 | Unlike knowledge, wisdom cannot be misused [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: A distinctive mark of wisdom is that it cannot be misused, whereas knowledge surely can be misused. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], I 1.2) | |
A reaction: She will argue, with Aristotle, that this is because wisdom (and maybe 'true' knowledge) must include 'phronesis' (practical wisdom), which is the key to all the virtues, intellectual and moral. This idea is striking, and obviously correct. |
19694 | Wisdom is the property of a person, not of their cognitive state [Zagzebski, by Whitcomb] |
Full Idea: Zagzebski takes wisdom as literally properties of persons, not persons' cognitive states. | |
From: report of Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], p.59-60) by Dennis Whitcomb - Wisdom 'Twofold' | |
A reaction: Not sure about this. Zagzebski uses this idea to endorse epistemic virtue. But knowledge and ignorance are properties of persons too. There can be, though, a precise mental state involved in knowledge, but not in wisdom. |
1502 | Parmenides was much more cautious about accepting ideas than his predecessors [Simplicius on Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Parmenides would not agree with anything unless it seemed necessary, whereas his predecessors used to come up with unsubstantiated assertions. | |
From: comment on Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], A28) by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.116.2- | |
A reaction: from Eudemus |
20221 | Precision is only one of the virtues of a good definition [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Precision is but one virtue of a definition, one that must be balanced against simplicity, elegance, conciseness, theoretical illumination, and practical usefulness. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 2.1) | |
A reaction: Illumination looks like the dream virtue for a good definition. Otherwise it is just ticked as accurate and stowed away. 'True justified belief' is a very illuminating definition of knowledge - if it is right. But it's not very precise. |
20220 | Objection by counterexample is weak, because it only reveals inaccuracies in one theory [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Objection by counterexample is the weakest sort of attack a theory can undergo. Even when the objection succeeds, it shows only that a theory fails to achieve complete accuracy. It does not distinguish among the various rival theories. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 2.1) | |
A reaction: Typically counterexamples are used to refute universal generalisations (i.e. by 'falsification'), but canny theorists avoid those, or slip in a qualifying clause. Counterexamples are good for exploring a theory's coverage. |
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) |
448 | No necessity could produce Being either later or earlier, so it must exist absolutely or not at all [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: What necessity impelled Being, if it did spring from nothing, to be produced later or earlier? Thus it must be absolutely, or not at all. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], B08 ll.?), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.145.1- |
447 | Being must be eternal and uncreated, and hence it is timeless [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Being has no coming-to-be and no destruction, for it is whole of limb, without motion, and without end. And it never was, nor will be, because it is now, a whole all together, one, continuous; for what creation of it will you look for? | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], B08 ll.?), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.145.1- |
449 | Being is not divisible, since it is all alike [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Being is not divisible, since it is all alike. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], B08 ll.?), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.145.1- |
1503 | There is no such thing as nothing [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: There is no such thing as nothing. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], B06), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.86.27- |
445 | The realm of necessary non-existence cannot be explored, because it is unknowable [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: The other way of enquiry, that IT IS NOT, and IT is bound NOT TO BE, cannot be explored, for you could neither recognise nor express that which IS NOT. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], B02), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.116.28- |
21820 | Parmenides at least saw Being as the same as Nous, and separate from the sensed realm [Parmenides, by Plotinus] |
Full Idea: Parmenides made some approach to the doctrine of Plato in identifying Being with Intellectual-Principle [Nous] while separating Real Being from the realm of sense. | |
From: report of Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]) by Plotinus - The Enneads 5.1.08 | |
A reaction: The point is that for Parmenides the One is the essence of Being, but for platonists there is something prior to and higher than Being. For Plato it is the Good; for Plotinus it is a revised (non-Being) concept of the One. |
452 | All our concepts of change and permanence are just names, not the truth [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: All things that mortals have established, believing in their truth, are just a name: Becoming and Perishing, Being and Not-Being, and change of position, and alteration of bright colour. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], B08 ll.?), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.145.1- |
1504 | Something must be unchanging to make recognition and knowledge possible [Aristotle on Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Parmenides and Melissus were the first to appreciate that there must be unchanging entities, if recognition and knowledge are to exist. | |
From: comment on Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], A25) by Aristotle - On the Heavens 298b14 |
444 | The first way of enquiry involves necessary existence [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: The first way of enquiry is the one that IT IS, and it is not possible for IT NOT TO BE, which is the way of credibility, for it follows truth. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], B02), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.116.28- | |
A reaction: also Proclus 'Timeus' |
450 | Necessity sets limits on being, in order to give it identity [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Powerful necessity holds Being in the bonds of a limit, which constrains it round about, because divine law decrees that Being shall not be without boundary. For it is not lacking, but if it were spatially infinite, it would lack everything. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], B08 ll.?), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.145.1- |
20188 | Modern epistemology is too atomistic, and neglects understanding [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: There are complaints that contemporary epistemology is too atomistic, and that the value of understanding has been neglected. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], I 2) | |
A reaction: This is because of the excessive influence of logic in contemporary analytic philosophy, which has to reduce knowledge to K(Fa), rather than placing it in a human context. |
20223 | Epistemology is excessively atomic, by focusing on justification instead of understanding [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: The present obsession with justification and the neglect of understanding has resulted in a feature of epistemology already criticised by several epistemologists: its atomism. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 2.2) | |
A reaction: All analytic philosophy has become excessively atomic, because it relies too heavily on logic for its grounding and rigour. There are other sorts of rigour, such as AI, peer review, programming. Or rigour is an idle dream. |
20217 | Truth is valuable, but someone knowing the truth is more valuable [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Of course we value the truth, but the value we place on knowledge is more than the value of the truth we thereby acquire. …It also involves a valuabe relation between the knower and the truth. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 1) | |
A reaction: Hard to assess this. I take truth to be a successful relationship between a mind and a fact. Knowledge needs something extra, to avoid lucky true beliefs. Does a truth acquire greater and greater value as more people come to know it? Doubtful. |
20191 | Some beliefs are fairly voluntary, and others are not at all so [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: My position is that beliefs, like acts, arrange themselves on a continuum of degrees of voluntariness, ranging from quite a bit to none at all. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], I 4.2) | |
A reaction: I'm sure we have no idea how we came to hold many of our beliefs, and if we see a cat, nothing seems to intervene between the seeing and the believing. But if you adopt a religion, believing its full creed is a big subsequent effort. |
20222 | Knowledge either aims at a quantity of truths, or a quality of understanding of truths [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Getting knowledge can be a matter either of reaching more truths or of gaining understanding of truths already believed. So it may be a way of increasing either the quality of true belief (cognitive contact with reality) or the quantity. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 2.1) | |
A reaction: I'm not sure how one would increase understanding of currently believed truths if it didn't involve adding some new truths to the collection. There is only the discovery of connections or structures, but those are new facts. |
451 | Thinking implies existence, because thinking depends on it [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: To think is the same as the thought that IT IS, for you will not find thinking without Being, on which it depends for its expression. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], B08 ll.?), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.145.1- |
1506 | Parmenides treats perception and intellectual activity as the same [Theophrastus on Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Parmenides treats perception and intellectual activity as the same. | |
From: comment on Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], A46) by Theophrastus - On the Senses 3.1 | |
A reaction: cf Theaetetus pt 1 |
3058 | Only reason can prove the truth of facts [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Reason alone will prove the truth of facts. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]), quoted by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.3.3 |
20225 | For internalists Gettier situations are where internally it is fine, but there is an external mishap [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: In internalist theories the grounds for justification are accessible to the believer, and Gettier problems arise when there is nothing wrong with the internally accessible aspects of the situation, but there is a mishap inaccessible to the believer. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 3.1) | |
A reaction: I'm sure we could construct an internal mishap which the believer was unaware of, such as two confusions of the meanings of words cancelling one another out. |
20226 | Gettier problems are always possible if justification and truth are not closely linked [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: As long as the concept of knowledge closely connects the justification component and the truth component but permits some degree of independence between them, justified true belief will never be sufficient for knowledge. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 3.1) | |
A reaction: Out of context this sounds like an advertisement for externalism. Or maybe it just says we have to live with Gettier threats. Zagzebski has other strategies. |
20228 | We avoid the Gettier problem if the support for the belief entails its truth [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: The way to avoid the Gettier problem is to define knowledge in such a way that truth is entailed by the other component(s) of the definition. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 3.1) | |
A reaction: Thus she defines virtuous justification as being successful, as virtues tend to be. This smacks of cheating. Surely we can be defeated in a virtuous way? If the truth is entailed then of course Gettier can be sent packing. |
20227 | Gettier cases arise when good luck cancels out bad luck [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: The procedure for generating Gettier cases involves 'double luck': an instance of good luck cancels out an instance of bad luck. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 3.2) | |
A reaction: You can end up with the right answer in arithmetic if you make two mistakes rather than one. I'm picturing a life of one blundering error after another, which to an outsider seems to be going serenely well. |
20194 | Intellectual virtues are forms of moral virtue [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: I argue that intellectual virtues are forms of moral virtue. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II Intro) | |
A reaction: This contrasts with Sosa, who seems to think intellectual virtues are just the most efficient ways of reaching the truth. I like Zabzebski's approach a lot, though we are in a very small minority. I love her book. We have epistemic and moral duties. |
20206 | Intellectual and moral prejudice are the same vice (and there are other examples) [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Maybe the intellectual and the moral forms of prejudice are the same vice, and this may also be true of other traits with shared names, such as humility, autonomy, integrity, perseverance, courage and trustworthiness. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.1) | |
A reaction: I find this claim very persuasive. The virtue of 'integrity' rather obviously embraces groups of both intellectually and morally desirable traits. |
20208 | We can name at least thirteen intellectual vices [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Some examples of intellectual vices: pride, negligence, idleness, cowardice, conformity, carelessness, rigidity, prejudice, wishful thinking, closed-mindedness, insensitivity to detail, obtuseness (in seeing relevance), and lack of thoroughness. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.1) | |
A reaction: There are thousands of vices for which we don't have names, like thinking about football when you should be doing metaphysics. The other way round is also a vice too, because football needs concentration. Discontent with your chair is bad too. |
20215 | A justified belief emulates the understanding and beliefs of an intellectually virtuous person [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: A justified belief is what a person who is motivated by intellectual virtue, and who has the understanding of his cognitive situation a virtuous person would have, might believe in like circumstances. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 6.1) | |
A reaction: This is a whole-hearted definition of justification in terms of a theory of intellectual virtues. Presumably this would allow robots to have justified beliefs, if they managed to behave the way intellectually virtuous persons would behave. |
20210 | A reliable process is no use without the virtues to make use of them [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: It is not enough that a process is reliable; a person will not reliably use such a process without certain virtues. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 4.1.2) | |
A reaction: This is a point against Sosa's reliabilist account of virtues. Of course, all theories of epistemic justification (or of morality) will fail if people can't be bothered to implement them. |
20187 | Epistemic perfection for reliabilism is a truth-producing machine [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Just as a utility-calculating machine would be the ideal moral agent according to utilitarianism, a truth-producing machine would be the ideal epistemic agent according to reliabilism, | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], I 1.2) | |
A reaction: Love this one! For consequentialists a successful robot is morally superior to an average human being. The reliabilist dream is just something that churns out truths. But what is the role of these truths in subsequent life? |
20218 | The self is known as much by its knowledge as by its action [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: It seems to me that the concept of the self is constituted as much by what we know as by what we do. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 1) | |
A reaction: People take pride in what they know, which indicates that it is of central importance to a person's nature. Hard to evaluate ideas such as this. |
20205 | The feeling accompanying curiosity is neither pleasant nor painful [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Most feelings are experienced as pleasant or painful, but it is not evident that they all are; curiosity may be one that is not. [note: 'curiosity' may not be the name of a feeling, but a feeling typically accompanies it] | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.1) | |
A reaction: If a machine generates a sliding scale from pain to pleasure, is there a neutral feeling at the midpoint, or does all feeling briefly vanish there? Not sure. |
20202 | Motives involve desires, but also how the desires connect to our aims [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: A motive does have an aspect of desire, but it includes something about why a state of affairs is desired, and that includes something about the way my emotions are tied to my aim. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.6) | |
A reaction: It is standard usage that a 'motive' involves some movement towards achieving the desire, and not merely having the desire. I'd quite like to stand on top of Everest, but have absolutely no motivation to try to achieve it. |
20216 | Modern moral theory concerns settling conflicts, rather than human fulfilment [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Modern ethics generally considers morality much less a system for fulfilling human nature than a set of principles for dealing with individuals in conflict. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 7) | |
A reaction: Historically I associate this move with Hugo Grotius around 1620. He was a great legalist, and eudaimonist virtue ethics gradually turned into jurisprudence. The Enlightenment sought rules for resolving dilemmas. Liberalism makes fulfilment private. |
20193 | Moral luck means our praise and blame may exceed our control or awareness [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Because of moral luck, the realm of the morally praiseworthy / blameworthy is not indisputably within one's voluntary control or accessible to one's consciousness. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], I 4.2) | |
A reaction: [She particularly cites Thomas Nagel for this] It is a fact that we will be blamed (more strongly) when we have moral bad luck, but the question is whether we should be. It seems harsh, but you can't punish someone as if they had had bad luck. |
20199 | Nowadays we doubt the Greek view that the flourishing of individuals and communities are linked [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Modern moral philosophers have been considerably more skeptical than were the ancient Greeks about the close association between the flourishing of the individual and that of the community. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.2) | |
A reaction: I presume this is not just a change in fashion, but a reflection of how different the two societies are. In a close community with almost no privacy, flourishing individuals are good citizens. In the isolations of modern liberalism they may be irrelevant. |
20196 | Virtue theory is hopeless if there is no core of agreed universal virtues [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: An analysis of virtue is hopeless unless we can assume that most of a selected list of traits count as virtues, in a way not strictly culture. ...These would include wisdom, courage, benevolence, justice, honesty, loyalty, integrity, and generosity. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.1) | |
A reaction: This requirement needs there to be a single core to human nature, right across the species. If we are infinitely flexible (as existentialists imply) then the virtues will have matching flexibility, and so will be parochial and excessively relative. |
20200 | A virtue must always have a corresponding vice [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: It is important for the nature of virtue that it have a corresponding vice (or two, in the doctrine of the mean). Claustrophobia is not a vice not only because it is involuntary, but also because there is no corresponding virtue. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.3) | |
A reaction: Presumably attaining a virtue is an achievement, so we would expect a label for failure in the same field of endeavour. The failure is not purely negative, because bad things ensue if the virtue is not present. |
20201 | Eight marks distingush skills from virtues [Zagzebski, by PG] |
Full Idea: The difference between skills and virtues is that virtues must be enacted, are always desirable, can't be forgotten, and can be simulated, whereas skills are very specific, involve a technique, lack contraries, and lack intrinsic value. | |
From: report of Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.4) by PG - Db (ideas) | |
A reaction: [my summary of her II 2.4 discussion of the differences] She observes that Aristotle made insufficient effort to distinguish the two. It may be obscure to say that virtues go 'deeper' than skills, but we all know what is meant. 'Skills serve virtues'. |
20203 | Virtues are deep acquired excellences of persons, which successfully attain desire ends [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: A virtue can be defined as 'a deep and enduring acquired excellence of a person, involving a characteristic motivation to produce a certain desired end and reliable success in bringing about that end'. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.7) | |
A reaction: She puts this in bold, and it is the culminating definition of a long discussion. It rather obviously fails to say anything about the nature of the end that is desired. Learning the telephone book off by heart seems to fit the definition. |
20207 | Every moral virtue requires a degree of intelligence [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: Being reasonably intelligent within a certain area of life is part of having almost any moral virtue. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.1) | |
A reaction: The fact that this bars persons of very limited intelligence from acquiring the Aristotelian virtues is one of the attractions of the Christian enjoinder to merely achieve 'love'. Anyone can have a warm heart. So is virtue elitist? |
20214 | Virtue theory can have lots of rules, as long as they are grounded in virtues and in facts [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: A pure virtue theory can have as many rules as you like as long as they are understood as grounded in the virtuous motivations and understanding of the nonmoral facts that virtuous agents possess. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 6.1) | |
A reaction: It is important, I think, to see that a virtue theorist does not have to be a particularist. |
20213 | We need phronesis to coordinate our virtues [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: We need phronesis (practical wisdom) to coordinate the various virtues into a single line of action or line of thought leading up to an act or to a belief. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 5.2) | |
A reaction: If I have a conflicting virtue and vice in a single situation, something must make sure that the virtue dominates. That sounds more like Kant's 'good will' than like phronesis. |
20209 | For the virtue of honesty you must be careful with the truth, and not just speak truly [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: It is not sufficient for honesty that a person tells whatever she happens to believe is the truth. An honest person is careful with the truth. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.2) | |
A reaction: Not sure about that. It matches what Aristotle says about courage, which also needs practical reason [phronesis]. But being sensitive and careful with truth seems to need other virtues. If total honesty is not a virtue, then is honesty a virtue at all? |
20197 | The courage of an evil person is still a quality worth having [Zagzebski] |
Full Idea: In the case of a courageous Nazi soldier, my position is that a virtue is worth having even in those cases in which it makes a person worse overall. | |
From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.2) | |
A reaction: A brave claim, which seems right. If a nasty Nazi reforms, they will at least have one good quality which can be put to constructive use. |
555 | People who say that the cosmos is one forget that they must explain movement [Aristotle on Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Those who assert that the universe is one and a single nature, when they try to give the causes of generation and destruction, miss out the cause of movement. | |
From: comment on Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 988b |
5081 | There could be movement within one thing, as there is within water [Aristotle on Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Why does it follow from there being only one thing that it is unmoving, since, for example, water moves internally while remaining one? | |
From: comment on Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]) by Aristotle - Physics 186a16 | |
A reaction: One suspects that Parmenides wasn't used to critical questions like this, and would have sharpened up his theory if it had been subjected to criticism. How big was the One? Maybe Aristotle is the real father of philosophy. |
1509 | The one can't be divisible, because if it was it could be infinitely divided down to nothing [Parmenides, by Simplicius] |
Full Idea: Since the one is everywhere alike, then if it is divisible, it will be equally divisible everywhere….so let it be divided everywhere. It is obvious that nothing will remain and the whole will vanish, and so (if it is compound) it is composed of nothing. | |
From: report of Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]) by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.139.5- | |
A reaction: he is quoting Porphyry |
20900 | Defenders of the One say motion needs the void - but that is not part of Being [Parmenides, by Aristotle] |
Full Idea: Defenders of the One say that there could not be motion without a void, and that void is what does not exist, and that nothing that is not belongs to being. | |
From: report of Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]) by Aristotle - Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) 325a26 | |
A reaction: This is why motion is an illusion, a view also supported by the paradoxes of Zeno of Elea. Aristotle goes on to give Democritus's response to this idea. Parmenides was contemplating 'void', before Democritus got to it. |
226 | The one is without any kind of motion [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: The one is without any kind of motion. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]), quoted by Plato - Parmenides 139a |
1505 | Reason sees reality as one, the senses see it as many [Aristotle on Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Since he is forced to be guided by appearances, he assumes that the one exists from the viewpoint of reason, but that a plurality exists from the viewpoint of the sense, and so he posits two principles and causes - hot and cold. | |
From: comment on Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], A24) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 986b27- | |
A reaction: A profound thought. Empiricists emphasies experience, and end up with fragmented reality. Reason explains experience, and in the process sees the world as unities (like objects), though a single unity is going too far. |
453 | Reality is symmetrical and balanced, like a sphere, with no reason to be greater one way rather than another [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: Since there is a spatial limit, it is complete on every side, like the mass of a well-rounded sphere, equally balanced from its centre in every direction; for it is not bound to be at all either greater or less in this direction or that. | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE], B08 ll.?), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.145.1- |
1792 | He taught that there are two elements, fire the maker, and earth the matter [Parmenides, by Diog. Laertius] |
Full Idea: He taught that there were two elements, fire and earth; and that one of them occupies the place of the maker, the other that of the matter. | |
From: report of Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Pa.2 |
5115 | It is feeble-minded to look for explanations of everything being at rest [Aristotle on Parmenides] |
Full Idea: For people to ignore the evidence of their senses and look for an explanation for everything being at rest is feeble-minded. | |
From: comment on Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]) by Aristotle - Physics 253a32 | |
A reaction: Not exactly an argument, but an interestingly robust assertion of commonsense against dodgy arguments. Aristotle is not exactly an empiricist, but he is on that side of the fence. |
13217 | The void can't exist, and without the void there can't be movement or separation [Parmenides, by Aristotle] |
Full Idea: Some philosophers thought what is must be one and immovable. The void, they say, is not: but unless there is a void what is cannot be moved, nor can it be many, since there is nothing to keep things apart. | |
From: report of Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]) by Aristotle - Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) 325a06 | |
A reaction: Somehow this doesn't seem very persuasive any more! I suppose we would distinguish various degrees of void, and assert the existence of sufficient void to allow movement and separation. We must surely agree that total nothingness doesn't exist. |
22918 | What could have triggered the beginning [of time and being]? [Parmenides] |
Full Idea: What need would have aroused it later or sooner, starting from nothing to come into being? | |
From: Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]), quoted by Robin Le Poidevin - Travels in Four Dimensions 02 'Everything' | |
A reaction: [Barnes 1982:178] This remains an excellent question. The last I heard was a 'quantum fluctuation', but that seems to be an event, which therefore needs time. |
1794 | He was the first to discover the identity of the Morning and Evening Stars [Parmenides, by Diog. Laertius] |
Full Idea: He appears to have been the first to discover that Hesperus and Lucifer were the same star. | |
From: report of Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Pa.3 | |
A reaction: This is the famous example used by Frege to discuss reference and meaning. |
1791 | He was the first person to say the earth is spherical [Parmenides, by Diog. Laertius] |
Full Idea: He was the first person who asserted that the earth was of a spherical form. | |
From: report of Parmenides (fragments/reports [c.474 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Pa.2 |