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All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'fragments/reports' and 'Creating Capabilities'

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31 ideas

1. Philosophy / B. History of Ideas / 2. Ancient Thought
Diogenes of Apollonia was the last natural scientist [Diogenes of Apollonia, by Simplicius]
     Full Idea: Diogenes of Apollonia was more or less the last of those who made a study of natural science.
     From: report of Diogenes (Apoll) (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], A05) by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.25.1
     A reaction: He quotes Theophrastus
2. Reason / B. Laws of Thought / 6. Ockham's Razor
Keep premises as weak as possible, to avoid controversial difficulties [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: One should always choose the weakest premises from which one's conclusion follows, rather than saddling the theory with thicker or more controversial premises.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 8)
     A reaction: I like this because it connects the rather vague Ockham's Razor to the logical concept of Thinning. The key point is that a thinner set of premises that prove something will be more persuasive, because critics may reject premises instead of conclusion.
9. Objects / F. Identity among Objects / 7. Indiscernible Objects
Each thing must be in some way unique [Diogenes of Apollonia]
     Full Idea: No one thing among things subject to change can possibly be exactly like any other thing, without becoming the same thing.
     From: Diogenes (Apoll) (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], B05), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 153.8
     A reaction: This is said to be the first ever formulation of the principle of identity of indiscernible.
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 2. Self-Evidence
Start a thesis with something undisputable [Diogenes of Apollonia]
     Full Idea: In starting any thesis, it seems to me, one should put forward as one's point of departure something incontrovertible.
     From: Diogenes (Apoll) (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], B01), quoted by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.57
12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 6. Inference in Perception
Perception must be an internal matter, because we can fail to perceive when we are preoccupied [Diogenes of Apollonia, by Theophrastus]
     Full Idea: That it is the inner air that perceives, as being a fragment of the god, is shown by the fact that often when our minds are preoccupied with other matters we fail to see or hear.
     From: report of Diogenes (Apoll) (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], A19) by Theophrastus - On the Senses 42
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 1. Physical Mind
The older Diogenes said the soul is air, made of the smallest particles [Diogenes of Apollonia]
     Full Idea: Diogenes [of Apollonia] took the soul to be air, thnking that of all things air is composed of the smallest particles and is a starting point.
     From: Diogenes (Apoll) (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], DK 64), quoted by Aristotle - De Anima 405a21
     A reaction: This suggests that Diogenes of Apollonia was an atomist, if the soul is made of particles. See also Met 984a5, which says Anaxagoras had the same view.
21. Aesthetics / B. Nature of Art / 8. The Arts / b. Literature
Storytelling is never neutral; some features of the world must be emphasised [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: Storytelling is never neutral; the narrator always directs attention to some features of the world rather than others.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 1)
     A reaction: The audience would be a bit stupid if it insisted on neutrality.
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 1. Virtue Theory / c. Particularism
Particularism gives no guidance for the future [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: Situation ethics offers no guidance for the future.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 8)
     A reaction: Not sure if Situation Ethics is the same as Particularism. Jonathan Danby famously champions the latter.
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 3. Virtues / f. Compassion
Compassion is unreliable, because it favours people close to us [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: Daniel Batson's important research has shown us that compassion is not reliable on its own, because it can easily give priority to people close to the self.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 8)
     A reaction: In Britain animal charities receive vastly more money than children's charities, presumably for this very reason. Kittens - you've got to hate them.
24. Political Theory / B. Nature of a State / 2. State Legitimacy / c. Social contract
Social contracts assume equal powers among the participants [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: All contract theories, including Rawls's, assume a rough equality of physical and mental power among the participants.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 4)
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 4. Social Utilitarianism
We shouldn't focus on actual preferences, which may be distorted by injustices [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: When society puts things out of reach for people, they typically learn not to want those things. ..By defining the social goal in terms of satisfaction of actual preferences, utilitarian approaches often reinforce the status quo, which may be very unjust.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 3)
     A reaction: Maximising happiness is potentially very paternalistic, whereas preference satisfaction is not, which aligns utilitarianism better with liberalism. It is notorious that slaves can be contented with their slavery, and battered wives can remain loyal.
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 6. Liberalism / a. Liberalism basics
Liberalism does not need a comprehensive account of value [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: The role of political liberalism in my theory requires me to prescind from offering any comprehensive account of value.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 2)
     A reaction: Obviously liberalism has values, but they are the minimum ones of freedom and respect. Liberals have to tolerate some fairly ugly and miserable societies. Can liberals intervene in family life?
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 12. Feminism
Women are often treated like children, and not respected for their choices [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: Women are often treated as passive dependents, creatures to be cared for (or not), rather than as independent human beings deserving respect for their choices. In other words they are often infantilized.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 3)
     A reaction: Her prime example is from India, but you see the same thing in more subtle forms in the UK, especially among older people, and especially in art galleries.
25. Social Practice / A. Freedoms / 5. Freedom of lifestyle
Negative liberty is incoherent; all liberties, to do and to be, require the prevention of interference [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: The very idea of 'negative liberty' ...is an incoherent idea: all liberties are positive, meaning liberties to do or to be something, which all require the inhibition of interference by others.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 3)
     A reaction: This rejects Isaiah Berlin's well-known claim that negative liberties are good, but positive liberties are far too dangerous.
25. Social Practice / A. Freedoms / 6. Political freedom
Political freedom is an incoherent project, because some freedoms limit other freedoms [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: It is unclear whether the idea of promoting freedom is even a coherent political project. Some freedoms limit others. The freedom of rich people to make large donations to political campaigns can limit the equal worth of the right to vote.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 4)
     A reaction: It is not just American right-wingers who over-emphasise 'freedom'. French philosophy seems to be riddled with the same thing.
25. Social Practice / C. Rights / 1. Basis of Rights
Political and civil rights are not separate from economic and social rights [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: My approach rejects the distinction, common in the human rights movement, between 'first-generation rights' (political and civil) and 'second-generation rights' (economic and social). The second group are preconditions of the first group.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 3)
     A reaction: [last sentence compressed] This sounds like the sort of point Marx argued for. Nowadays it is feminists who make this point most strongly.
25. Social Practice / D. Justice / 1. Basis of justice
Capabilities: Life, Health, Safety, Mental life, Love, Planning, Joining in, Nature, Play, Control [Nussbaum, by PG]
     Full Idea: Ten Capabilities: Life (decent), Health (reproduction, shelter), Safety, Mental life (with education), Love (relationships), Planning (with free beliefs), Joining in (and non-discrimination), Nature (relations to), Play, Control (politics and property).
     From: report of Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 2) by PG - Db (ideas)
     A reaction: She gives her crucial list in rather wordy form. To have impact it needs to be reduced to brief simple slogans.
Justice requires that the ten main capabilities of people are reasonably enabled [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: The basic claim of my account of social justice is this: respect for human dignity requires that citizens be placed above an ample (specified) threshold of capability in all ten of the areas.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 2)
     A reaction: [The capabilities are given, briefly, in Idea 21009] The one word that bothers me here is 'dignity'. It is very vague, and can, I think, be reduced to much clearer and more obvious concepts. A person lacks dignity when they vomit, in ordinary usage.
Capabilities are grounded in bare humanity and agency; qualifying as rational is not needed [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: The capabilities approach grounds rights claims in bare human birth and minimal agency, not in rationality or any other specific property, something that permits it to recognise the equal human rights of people with cognitive disabilities.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 3)
     A reaction: She says elsewhere that she also sees animals as included in the capabilities approach. This is a rejection of the Kantian grounds for rights (by a well-known Aristotelian).
Rights are not just barriers against state interference; governments must affirm capabilities of citizens [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: A prominent idea, common in the U.S., sees rights as barriers against interfering state action. ...The Capabilities Approach, by contrast, insists that all entitlements involve an affirmative task for government, to actively support capabilities.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 3)
     A reaction: This makes her approach very left wing, by U.S. standards, because it needs higher taxation and a degree of government paternalism. Her approach strikes me as an excellent agenda for a fairly interventionist European liberal party.
25. Social Practice / E. Policies / 2. Religion in Society
Any establishment belief system is incompatible with full respect for all citizens [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: The idea of equal respect is difficult or impossible to render compatible with a religious establishment, even one that is benign and noncoercive. Any established church (or government secularism) denigrates nonbelievers, by stating they are an out-group.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 4)
     A reaction: This sort of applies to membership of anything. She is sort of right, but there is no reason in principle why full respect should not be accorded to any out-group.
25. Social Practice / E. Policies / 5. Education / b. Education principles
Learned men gain more in one day than others do in a lifetime [Posidonius]
     Full Idea: In a single day there lies open to men of learning more than there ever does to the unenlightened in the longest of lifetimes.
     From: Posidonius (fragments/reports [c.95 BCE]), quoted by Seneca the Younger - Letters from a Stoic 078
     A reaction: These remarks endorsing the infinite superiority of the educated to the uneducated seem to have been popular in late antiquity. It tends to be the religions which discourage great learning, especially in their emphasis on a single book.
25. Social Practice / F. Life Issues / 6. Animal Rights
We should respect animals in the way that we respect the animal nature in humans [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: If we show respect to our own animal natures, it is simply inconsistent, and a kind of vicious self-promoting of a sort to which Kantians are especially opposed, to refuse the same respect to our fellow creatures.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 8)
     A reaction: Nussbaum says Kant is hopeless on animals, but Christine Korsgaard offers this Kantian approach that demands genuine respect for animals, even though they are not considered rational. Nussbaum says animals are agents. Did Kant respect our animality?
It may be no harm to kill an animal which cannot plan for its future [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: The painless killing of an animal of a species that does not make plans extending into the future may not be a harm: this depends on how we think about the harm of death.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 8)
     A reaction: Very old human beings may have no plans for the future. I, on the other hand, have got lots and lots of plans. Definitely. No one can specify the harm of death. How can it be distinguished from the harm of not being born?
The Capabilities Approach sees animals as agents, not just as having feelings [Nussbaum]
     Full Idea: The Capabilities Approach sees animals as agents, not as receptacles of pleasure or pain.
     From: Martha Nussbaum (Creating Capabilities [2011], 8)
     A reaction: This is in opposition to the utilitarian view. The key consequence is that animals can be victims of injustice, as well as of cruelty. Nice.
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 2. Natural Purpose / a. Final purpose
Diogenes of Apollonia offered the first teleological account of cosmology [Diogenes of Apollonia, by Robinson,TM]
     Full Idea: Credit for the first clear assertion of teleological explanation in cosmology goes to Diogenes of Apollonia, for whom air is the divine and intelligent ground of the real and disposes things in the best possible way.
     From: report of Diogenes (Apoll) (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE]) by T.M. Robinson - Classical Cosmology (frags)
     A reaction: The first teleological explanation seems to be based on a conscious mind. There also emerges the possibility of some sort of non-conscious teleology, closer to the laws of physics than to God.
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 6. Early Matter Theories / c. Ultimate substances
Air is divine, because it is in and around everything, and arranges everything [Diogenes of Apollonia]
     Full Idea: Air in itself seems to me to be God and to reach everywhere and to arrange everything and to be in everything.
     From: Diogenes (Apoll) (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], B05), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 152.22-
     A reaction: So water and fire and air have been offered as the ultimate explanans, though no one seems to offer earth, which is too grubby and miserable (and was denied a Form by Plato). 'Air is God' could ground a nice modern religious sect.
Everything is ultimately a variation of one underlying thing [Diogenes of Apollonia]
     Full Idea: It seems to me that all existing things are created by the alteration of the same thing, and are the same thing.
     From: Diogenes (Apoll) (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], B02), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 151.31-
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 6. Early Matter Theories / f. Ancient elements
Plants and animals can only come into existence if something fixes their species [Diogenes of Apollonia]
     Full Idea: No plant could grow out of the earth, and no animal or any other thing could come into being, unless it were so compounded as to be the same.
     From: Diogenes (Apoll) (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], B02), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 151.31-
Things must retain their essential nature during change, or mixing would be impossible [Diogenes of Apollonia]
     Full Idea: If any existing thing were different in its own essential nature, and were not the same thing which was transformed in many ways and changed, in no way could things mix with one another.
     From: Diogenes (Apoll) (fragments/reports [c.440 BCE], B02), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 151.31-
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / d. Time as measure
Time is an interval of motion, or the measure of speed [Posidonius, by Stobaeus]
     Full Idea: Posidonius defined time thus: it is an interval of motion, or the measure of speed and slowness.
     From: report of Posidonius (fragments/reports [c.95 BCE]) by John Stobaeus - Anthology 1.08.42
     A reaction: Hm. Can we define motion or speed without alluding to time? Looks like we have to define them as a conjoined pair, which means we cannot fully understand either of them.