Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Protagoras', 'Contextualism Contested (and reply)' and 'De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence)'

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30 ideas

2. Reason / B. Laws of Thought / 4. Contraries
Only one thing can be contrary to something [Plato]
     Full Idea: To everything that admits of a contrary there is one contrary and no more.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 332c)
     A reaction: The sort of thing for which a modern philosopher would demand a proof (and then reject when the proof couldn't be found), where a Greek is happy to assert it as self-evident. I can't think of a counterexample.
2. Reason / D. Definition / 5. Genus and Differentia
If definitions must be general, and general terms can't individuate, then Socrates can't be defined [Aquinas, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne]
     Full Idea: Socrates has no definition if definitions by their nature must be in purely general terms, and if no purely general terms can succeed in uniquely singling out this signated matter.
     From: report of Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], 23) by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 1.1.2
     A reaction: There seem to be two models. That general terms actually individuate the matter of Socrates, or that they cross-reference to (so to speak) define Socrates 'by elimination', as the only individual that fits. But the latter is a poor definition.
The definitions expressing identity are used to sort things [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: What sorts things into their proper genus and species are the definitions that express what they are.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.92)
     A reaction: This is straight from Aristotle, though Aristotle's view is a little more complex, I think. If the definitions 'express what they are', then definitions seem to specify the essence.
7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 3. Being / e. Being and nothing
If affirmative propositions express being, we affirm about what is absent [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: If being is what makes propositions true, then anything we can express in an affirmative proposition, however unreal, is said to be; so lacks and absences are, since we say that absences are opposed to presences, and blindness exists in an eye.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.92)
     A reaction: See Idea 11194 for the alternative Aristotelian approach to being, according to categories. Do absences and lacks have real essences, or causal properties? The absence of the sentry may cause the loss of the city.
8. Modes of Existence / B. Properties / 8. Properties as Modes
Properties have an incomplete essence, with definitions referring to their subject [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: Incidental properties have an incomplete essence, and need to refer in their definitions to their subject, lying outside their own genus.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.93)
     A reaction: These are 'incidental' properties, but it is a nice question whether properties have essences. Presumably they must have if they are universals, or platonic Forms. The notion of being 'strong' can be defined without specific examples.
8. Modes of Existence / D. Universals / 6. Platonic Forms / c. Self-predication
If asked whether justice itself is just or unjust, you would have to say that it is just [Plato]
     Full Idea: If someone asked me 'Is justice itself just or unjust?' I should answer that it was just, wouldn't you? I agree.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 330c)
8. Modes of Existence / D. Universals / 6. Platonic Forms / d. Forms critiques
If the form of 'human' contains 'many', Socrates isn't human; if it contains 'one', Socrates is Plato [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: If (in the Platonic view) manyness was contained in humanness it could never be one as it is in Socrates, and if oneness was part of its definition then Socrates would be Plato and the nature couldn't be realised more than once.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.100)
     A reaction: I suppose the reply is that since we are trying to explain one-over-many, then this unusual combination of both manyness and oneness is precisely what distinguishes forms from other ideas.
9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / a. Individuation
The principle of diversity for corporeal substances is their matter [Aquinas, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne]
     Full Idea: In the view of Aquinas, while substantial form is the ultimate ground of identity and difference of angels, it is matter that provides a principle of diversity in the case of corporeal substances.
     From: report of Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267]) by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 5.2.3
     A reaction: This is at least as good a proposal as their apatial location. There is more chance of reidentifying matter than of precisely reidentifying a spatial location. Two indistinguishable spheres remain the classic problem case (of Max Black, Idea 10195)
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 1. Essences of Objects
It is by having essence that things exist [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: It is by having essence that things exist.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.94)
     A reaction: Compare Idea 11199, which gives a fuller picture. This idea seems to suggest essence as the cause of existence, which sounds wrong. Perhaps essence is a necessary condition of existence, but it is necessary that nothing indeterminate can exist?
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 2. Types of Essence
Specific individual essence is defined by material, and generic essence is defined by form [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: Specific essence differs from generic essence by being demarcated: individuals are demarcated within species by dimensionally defined material, but species within genus by a defining differentiation taken from the form.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.95)
     A reaction: It clearly won't be enough to define an individual just to define its material and its shape. The material might also be essential to the genus, as when defining fire. Probably not very helpful.
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 4. Essence as Definition
The definition of a physical object must include the material as well as the form [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: Form alone cannot be a composite substance's essence. For a thing's essence is expressed by its definition, and unless the definition of a physical substance included both form and material, the definition wouldn't differ from mathematical objects.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.93)
     A reaction: This is the sort of thoroughly sensible remark that you only get from the greatest philosophers. Minor philosophers fall in love with things like forms, and then try to use them to explain everything.
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 5. Essence as Kind
Essence is something in common between the natures which sort things into categories [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: Since being as belonging to a category expresses the 'isness' of things, and belongs to all ten Aristotelian categories, essence must be something all the natures that sort different beings into genera and species have in common.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.92)
     A reaction: I like this because it is the essence which does the sorting, not the sorting which defines the essence (which seems to me to be a deep and widespread confusion).
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 6. Essence as Unifier
A simple substance is its own essence [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: A simple substance is its own essence.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.103)
     A reaction: Aquinas takes complex substances to have their essences in various ways, but this thought is the basis of all essence. Presumably the Greek word 'ousia' names the key ingredient.
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 3. Value of Knowledge
The only real evil is loss of knowledge [Plato]
     Full Idea: The only real kind of faring ill is the loss of knowledge.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 345b)
     A reaction: This must crucially involve the intellectualist view (of Socrates) that virtuos behaviour results from knowledge, and moral wickedness is the result of ignorance. It is hard to see how forgetting a phone number is evil.
The most important things in life are wisdom and knowledge [Plato]
     Full Idea: It would be shameful indeed to say that wisdom and knowledge are anything but the most powerful forces in human activity.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 352d)
     A reaction: He lumps wisdom and knowledge together, and I think we can take 'knowledge' to mean something like understanding, because obviously mere atomistic propositional knowledge can be utterly trivial.
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 6. Contextual Justification / a. Contextualism
People begin to doubt whether they 'know' when the answer becomes more significant [Conee]
     Full Idea: Fluent speakers typically become increasingly hesitant about 'knowledge' attributions as the practical significance of the right answer increases.
     From: Earl Conee (Contextualism Contested (and reply) [2005], 'Epistemic')
     A reaction: The standard examples of this phenomenon are in criminal investigations, and in philosophical discussions of scepticism. Simple observations I take to have maximum unshakable confidence, except in extreme global scepticism contexts.
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 6. Contextual Justification / b. Invariantism
Maybe low knowledge standards are loose talk; people will deny that it is 'really and truly' knowledge [Conee]
     Full Idea: Maybe variable knowledge ascriptions are just loose talk. This is shown when we ask whether weakly supported knowledge is 'really' or 'truly' or 'really and truly' known. Fluent speakers have a strong inclination to doubt or deny that it is.
     From: Earl Conee (Contextualism Contested (and reply) [2005], 'Loose')
     A reaction: [bit compressed] Conee is suggesting the people are tacitly invariantist about knowledge (they have a fixed standard). But it may be that someone who asks 'do you really and truly know?' is raising the contextual standard. E.g. a barrister.
Maybe knowledge has fixed standards (high, but attainable), although people apply contextual standards [Conee]
     Full Idea: It may be that all 'knowledge' attributions have the same truth conditions, but people apply contextually varying standards. The most plausible standard for truth is very high, but not unreachably high.
     From: Earl Conee (Contextualism Contested (and reply) [2005], 'Loose')
     A reaction: This is the 'invariantist' alternative to contextualism about knowledge. Is it a standard 'for truth'? Either it is or it isn't true, so there isn't a standard. I take the standard to concern the justification.
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / k. Explanations by essence
Definition of essence makes things understandable [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: It is definition of essence that makes things understandable.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.92)
     A reaction: The aim of philosophy is understanding, which is achieved by successful explanation. I totally agree with this Aristotelian view, so neatly summarised by Aquinas.
15. Nature of Minds / C. Capacities of Minds / 7. Seeing Resemblance
Everything resembles everything else up to a point [Plato]
     Full Idea: Everything resembles everything else up to a point.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 331d)
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 3. Predicates
The mind constructs complete attributions, based on the unified elements of the real world [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: Attribution is something mind brings to completion by constructing propositional connections and disconnections, basing itself on real-world unity possessed by the things being attributed to one another.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.102)
     A reaction: This compromise story seems to me to be exactly right. I take it that we respond to the real joints of nature, but using thought and language which is riddled with convention.
20. Action / C. Motives for Action / 3. Acting on Reason / b. Intellectualism
Courage is knowing what should or shouldn't be feared [Plato]
     Full Idea: Knowledge of what is and is not to be feared is courage.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 360d)
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 2. Values / j. Evil
No one willingly and knowingly embraces evil [Plato]
     Full Idea: No one willingly goes to meet evil, or what he thinks is evil.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 358d)
     A reaction: Presumably people who actively choose satanism can override this deep-seated attitude. But their adherence to evil usually seems to be rather restrained. A danger of tautology with ideas like this.
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / h. Good as benefit
Some things are good even though they are not beneficial to men [Plato]
     Full Idea: 'Do you mean by good those things that are beneficial to men?' 'Not only those. I call some things which are not beneficial good as well'.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 333e)
     A reaction: Examples needed, but this would be bad news for utilitarians. Good health is not seen as beneficial if it is taken for granted. Not being deaf.
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 3. Pleasure / c. Value of pleasure
Some pleasures are not good, and some pains are not evil [Plato]
     Full Idea: There are some pleasures which are not good, and some pains which are not evil.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 351d)
     A reaction: Sadism and child birth. Though Bentham (I think) says that there is nothing good about the pain, since the event would obviously be better without it.
People tend only to disapprove of pleasure if it leads to pain, or prevents future pleasure [Plato]
     Full Idea: The only reason the common man disapproves of pleasures is if they lead to pain and deprive us of future pleasures.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 354a)
     A reaction: Plato has a strong sense that some pleasures are just innately depraved and wicked. If those pleasure don't hurt anyone, it is very hard to pinpoint what is wrong with them.
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / d. Teaching virtue
Socrates did not believe that virtue could be taught [Plato]
     Full Idea: Socrates: I do not believe that virtue can be taught.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 320b)
Socrates is contradicting himself in claiming virtue can't be taught, but that it is knowledge [Plato]
     Full Idea: Socrates is contradicting himself by saying virtue is not teachable, and yet trying to demonstrate that every virtue is knowledge.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 361b)
If we punish wrong-doers, it shows that we believe virtue can be taught [Plato]
     Full Idea: Athenians inflict punishment on wrong-doers, which shows that they too think it possible to impart and teach goodness.
     From: Plato (Protagoras [c.380 BCE], 324c)
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 5. Direction of causation
A cause can exist without its effect, but the effect cannot exist without its cause [Aquinas]
     Full Idea: When things are so related that one causes the other to exist, the cause can exist without what it causes but not vice versa.
     From: Thomas Aquinas (De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) [1267], p.103)
     A reaction: This is open to question, if causes are supposed to be sufficient for effects. Presumably Aquinas would support the view that if the cause had not been, the effect would not have happened. But the current idea indicates the priority relation.