12 ideas
| 23877 | Most people won't question an idea's truth if they depend on it [Weil] |
| Full Idea: The majority of human beings do not question the truth of an idea without which they would literally be unable to live. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Is There a Marxist Doctrine? [1943], p.163) | |
| A reaction: I assume that this inability grows stronger with age, as the dependence on the idea runs deeper. Hence for most people the beliefs which sustain them have a higher value than truth. Obviously we should all make love of truth our guiding idea! |
| 18076 | Most theories are continually falsified [Kuhn, by Kitcher] |
| Full Idea: Kuhn contends that almost all theories are falsified at almost all times. | |
| From: report of Thomas S. Kuhn (Structure of Scientific Revolutions (2nd ed) [1962]) by Philip Kitcher - The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge 07.1 | |
| A reaction: This is obviously meant to demolish Karl Popper. |
| 22191 | Kuhn's scientists don't aim to falsifying their paradigm, because that is what they rely on [Kuhn, by Gorham] |
| Full Idea: In Kuhn's view scientists are decidedly not interested in falsifying their paradigm, because without a paradigm there is no systematic inquiry at all. | |
| From: report of Thomas S. Kuhn (Structure of Scientific Revolutions (2nd ed) [1962]) by Geoffrey Gorham - Philosophy of Science 3 | |
| A reaction: This seems to be one of the stronger aspects of Kuhn's account. You'd be leaving the big house, to go out on the road with a tent. |
| 22183 | Switching scientific paradigms is a conversion experience [Kuhn] |
| Full Idea: The transfer of allegiance from paradigm to paradigm is a conversion experience which cannot be forced. | |
| From: Thomas S. Kuhn (Structure of Scientific Revolutions (2nd ed) [1962]), quoted by Samir Okasha - Philosophy of Science: Very Short Intro (2nd ed) 5 | |
| A reaction: This is the controversial part of Kuhn, which says that the most important decisions are not really rational. Anyone who thought the interpretation of a bunch of evidence is logical needed their head examined. But it IS rational. |
| 6162 | Kuhn has a description theory of reference, so the reference of 'electron' changes with the descriptions [Rowlands on Kuhn] |
| Full Idea: Kuhn and Feyerabend adopt a description theory of reference; the term 'electron' refers to whatever satisfies the descriptions associated with electrons, and since these descriptions vary between theories, so too must the reference. | |
| From: comment on Thomas S. Kuhn (Structure of Scientific Revolutions (2nd ed) [1962]) by Mark Rowlands - Externalism Ch.3 | |
| A reaction: This is a key idea in modern philosophy, showing why all of reality and science were at stake when Kripke and others introduced a causal theory of reference. All the current debates about externalism and essentialism grow from this problem. |
| 22184 | Incommensurability assumes concepts get their meaning from within the theory [Kuhn, by Okasha] |
| Full Idea: The doctrine of incommensurability stems from Kuhn's belief that scientific concepts derive their meaning from the theory in which they play a role. | |
| From: report of Thomas S. Kuhn (Structure of Scientific Revolutions (2nd ed) [1962]) by Samir Okasha - Philosophy of Science: Very Short Intro (2nd ed) 5 | |
| A reaction: Quine was the source of this. Kripke's direct reference theory was meant to be the answer. |
| 7619 | Galileo's notions can't be 'incommensurable' if we can fully describe them [Putnam on Kuhn] |
| Full Idea: To tell us that Galileo had 'incommensurable' notions and then go on to describe them at length is totally incoherent. | |
| From: comment on Thomas S. Kuhn (Structure of Scientific Revolutions (2nd ed) [1962]) by Hilary Putnam - Reason, Truth and History Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: How refreshingly sensible. Incommensurability is the sort of nonsense you slide into if you take an instrumental view of science. But scientists are continually aim to pin down what is actually there. Translation between theories is very difficult! |
| 23878 | Weakness of will is the inadequacy of the original impetus to carry through the action [Weil] |
| Full Idea: It is naïve to be astonished when we do not stick to firm resolutions. Something stimulated the resolution, but that something was not powerful enough to bring us to the point of carrying it out. Making the resolution may even have exhausted the stimulus. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Is There a Marxist Doctrine? [1943], p.169) | |
| A reaction: Socrates says it is a change of belief. Aristotle says it is a desire overcoming a belief. Weil gives a third way: that it is a fading in the strength of the original belief/desire impetus. |
| 23879 | In a violent moral disagreement, it can't be that both sides are just following social morality [Weil] |
| Full Idea: If two men are in violent disagreement about good and evil, it is hard to believe that both of them are blindly subject to the opinion of the society around them. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Is There a Marxist Doctrine? [1943], p.171) | |
| A reaction: What a beautifully simple observation. Simone would have become a major figure if she had lived longer. No philosopher has ever written better prose. |
| 23880 | When war was a profession, customary morality justified any act of war [Weil] |
| Full Idea: At the time when war was a profession, fighting men had a morality whereby any act of war, in accordance with the customs of war, and contributing to victory, was legitimate and right. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Is There a Marxist Doctrine? [1943], p.173) | |
| A reaction: Note the caveat about 'customs', which were largely moral. See the discussion of killing the non-combatant prisoners in Shakespeare's 'Henry V'. |
| 13304 | 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. |
| 20820 | 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. |