46 ideas
| 1798 | He studied philosophy by suspending his judgement on everything [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: He studied philosophy on the principle of suspending his judgement on all points. | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.3 | |
| A reaction: In what sense was Pyrrho a philosopher, then? He must have asserted SOME generalised judgments. |
| 14052 | Begin philosophy when you are young, and keep going when you are old [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: Let no one delay the study of philosophy while young nor weary of it when old; for no one is either too young or too old for the health of the soul. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 122) | |
| A reaction: I agree with this on both accounts. I think the correct age to begin the study of philosophy is four, and it is vital to continue its study up to the point where you can no longer remember your own name. 'Health of the soul' sounds right too. |
| 1800 | Sceptics say reason is only an instrument, because reason can only be attacked with reason [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: The Sceptics say that they only employ reason as an instrument, because it is impossible to overturn the authority of reason, without employing reason. | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.8 |
| 13985 | A true proposition seems true of one fact, but a false proposition seems true of nothing at all. [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: Whereas there might be just one fact that a true proposition was like, we would have to say that a false proposition was unlike any fact. We could not speak of the fact that it was false of, so we could not speak of its being false of anything at all. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], 'Objections') | |
| A reaction: Ryle brings out very nicely the point Russell emphasised so much, that the most illuminating studies in philosophy are of how falsehood works, rather than of how truths work. If I say 'the Queen is really a man' it is obvious what that is false of. |
| 13984 | Two maps might correspond to one another, but they are only 'true' of the country they show [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: One map of Sussex is like another, but it is not true of that other map, but only of the county. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], 'Objections') | |
| A reaction: One might question whether a map is in any sense 'true' of Sussex, though one must admit that there are good and bad maps of Sussex. The point is a nice one, which shows that there is no simple account of truth as correspondence. |
| 13979 | Logic studies consequence, compatibility, contradiction, corroboration, necessitation, grounding.... [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: Logic studies the way in which one thing follows from another, in which one thing is compatible with another, contradicts, corroborates or necessitates another, is a special case of another or the nerve of another. And so on. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], IV) | |
| A reaction: I presume that 'and so on' would include how one thing proves another. This is quite a nice list, which makes me think a little more widely about the nature of logic (rather than just about inference). Incompatibility isn't a process. |
| 13988 | Many sentences do not state facts, but there are no facts which could not be stated [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: There are many sentences which do not state facts, while there are no facts which (in principle) could not be stated. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], 'Substitute') | |
| A reaction: Hm. This seems like a nice challenge. The first problem would be infinite facts. Then complex universal facts, beyond the cognizance of any mind. Then facts that change faster than thinking can change. Do you give up yet? Then there's.... |
| 13983 | Representation assumes you know the ideas, and the reality, and the relation between the two [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: The theory of Representative Ideas begs the whole question, by assuming a) that we can know these 'Ideas', b) that we can know the realities they represent, and c) we can know a particular 'idea' to be representative of a particular reality. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], 'Objections') | |
| A reaction: Personally I regard the ideas as immediate (rather than acquired by some knowledge process), and I am dimly hoping that they represent reality (or I'm in deep trouble), and I am struggling to piece together the reality they represent. I'm happy with that. |
| 6595 | If we need a criterion of truth, we need to know whether it is the correct criterion [Pyrrho, by Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: Against the Stoics, the Pyrrhonians argued that if someone presents a criterion of truth, then it will be important to determine whether it is the correct criterion. | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Robert Fogelin - Walking the Tightrope of Reason Ch.4 | |
| A reaction: Hence Davidson says that attempts to define truth are 'folly'. If something has to be taken as basic, then truth seems a good candidate (since, for example, logical operators could not otherwise be defined by means of 'truth' tables). |
| 6593 | The Pyrrhonians attacked the dogmas of professors, not ordinary people [Pyrrho, by Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: The attacks of the Pyrrhonian sceptics are directed against the dogmas of the 'professors', not against the beliefs of the common people pursuing the business of daily life. | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Robert Fogelin - Walking the Tightrope of Reason Ch.4 | |
| A reaction: This may be because they thought that ordinary people were too confused to be worth attacking, rather than because they lived in a state of beautifully appropriate beliefs. Naïve realism is certainly worth attacking. |
| 6592 | Academics said that Pyrrhonians were guilty of 'negative dogmatism' [Pyrrho, by Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: The ancient Academic sceptics charged the Pyrrhonian sceptics with 'negative dogmatism' when they claimed that a certain kind of knowledge is impossible. | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Robert Fogelin - Walking the Tightrope of Reason Ch.4 | |
| A reaction: It is this kind of point which should push us towards some sort of rationalism, because certain a priori 'dogmas' seem to be indispensable to get any sort of discussion off the ground. The only safe person is Cratylus (see Idea 578). |
| 1805 | Judgements vary according to local culture and law (Mode 5) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Fifth mode: judgements vary according to local custom, law and culture (Persians marry their daughters). | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.9 |
| 1803 | Objects vary according to which sense perceives them (Mode 3) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Third mode: things like an apple vary according to which sense perceives them (yellow, sweet, and fragrant). | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.9 |
| 1807 | Perception varies with viewing distance and angle (Mode 7) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Seventh mode: perception varies according to viewing distance and angle (the sun, and a dove's neck). | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.9 |
| 1810 | Perception and judgement depend on comparison (Mode 10) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Tenth mode: perceptions and judgements depend on comparison (light/heavy, above/below). | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.9 |
| 1802 | Individuals vary in responses and feelings (Mode 2) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Second mode: individual men vary in responses and feelings (heat and cold, for example). | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.9 |
| 1801 | Animals vary in their feelings and judgements (Mode 1) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: First mode: animals vary in their feelings and judgements (of food, for example). | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.9 |
| 1804 | Perception varies with madness or disease (Mode 4) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Fourth mode: perceivers vary in their mental and physical state (such as the mad and the sick). | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.9 |
| 1808 | Perception of things depends on their size or quantity (Mode 8) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Eighth mode: perceptions of things depend on their magnitude or quantity (food and wine). | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.9 |
| 1806 | Perception of objects depends on surrounding conditions (Mode 6) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Sixth mode: the perception of an object depends on surrounding conditions (sunlight and lamplight). | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.9 |
| 1809 | Perception is affected by expectations (Mode 9) [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Ninth mode: we perceive things according to what we expect (earthquakes and sunshine). | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.Py.9 |
| 14062 | Sooner follow mythology, than accept the 'fate' of natural philosophers [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: It would be better to follow the stories told about the gods than to be a slave to the fate of the natural philosophers. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 134) | |
| A reaction: At this point in history there is a blurring between autonomous decisions and what we now call free will, and also between fate and determinism, which we try to keep distinct. |
| 1837 | We should not refer things to irresponsible necessity, but either to fortune or to our own will [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: The best men have no belief in necessity (set up by some as mistress of all), but refer some things to fortune, some to ourselves, because necessity is irresponsible, and fortune is unstable, while our own will is free. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 133), quoted by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 10.27 |
| 13980 | If you like judgments and reject propositions, what are the relata of incoherence in a judgment? [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: Those who find 'judgments' everywhere and propositions nowhere find that some judgments cohere whereas others are incoherent. What is the status of the terms between which these relations hold? | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], IV) | |
| A reaction: Ryle is playing devil's advocate, but this strikes me as a nice point. I presume Russell after 1906 is the sort of thinker he has in mind. |
| 13978 | Husserl and Meinong wanted objective Meanings and Propositions, as subject-matter for Logic [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: It is argued by Husserl and (virtually) by Meinong that only if there are such entities as objective Meanings - and propositions are just a species of Meaning - is there anything for Logic to be about. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], IV) | |
| A reaction: It is presumably this proposal which led to the scepticism about meanings in Wittgenstein, Quine and Kripke. The modern view, which strikes me as right, is that logic is about inference, and so doesn't need a subject-matter. |
| 13977 | When I utter a sentence, listeners grasp both my meaning and my state of mind [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: If I have uttered my sentence aloud, a listener can both understand what I say or grasp my meaning, and also infer to my state of mind. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], I) | |
| A reaction: This simple observations seems rather important. If we shake written words onto the floor, they might add up to a proper sentence, but half of the point of a sentence is missing. Irony trades on the gap between meaning and state of mind. |
| 13976 | 'Propositions' name what is thought, because 'thoughts' and 'judgments' are too ambiguous [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: As the orthodox terms 'thoughts' and 'judgments' are equivocal, since they may equally well denote 'thinkings' as 'what-is-thought', the 'accusatives' of acts of thinking have come to be called 'propositions'. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], I) | |
| A reaction: I have understood propositions to be capable of truth or falsity. 'What is thought' could be a right old jumble of images and disjointed fragments. Propositions are famous for their unity! |
| 13981 | Several people can believe one thing, or make the same mistake, or share one delusion [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: We ordinarily find no difficulty in saying of a given thing that several people believe it and so, if they think it false, 'make the same mistake' or 'labour under the same delusion'. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], IV) | |
| A reaction: Ryle is playing devil's advocate, but this (like 13980) strikes me as quite good support for propositions. I suppose you can describe these phenomena as assent to sentences, but they might be very different sentences to express the same delusion. |
| 13987 | We may think in French, but we don't know or believe in French [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: Although we speak of thinking in French, we never talk of knowing or believing or opining in French. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], 'Substitute') | |
| A reaction: Once again Ryle is playing devil's advocate, but he does it rather well, and offers good support for my belief in propositions. I love this. 'I know, in French, a bank where the wild thyme blows'. |
| 13989 | There are no propositions; they are just sentences, used for thinking, which link to facts in a certain way [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: There are no substantial propositions...There is just a relation between grammatical structure and the logical structure of facts. 'Proposition' denotes the same as 'sentence' or 'statement'. A proposition is not what I think, but what I think or talk in. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], 'Conclusions') | |
| A reaction: The conclusion of Ryle's discussion, but I found his support for propositions much more convincing than his critique of them, or his attempt at an alternative linguistic account. He never mentioned animals, so he self-evidently hasn't grasped the problem. |
| 13982 | If we accept true propositions, it is hard to reject false ones, and even nonsensical ones [Ryle] |
| Full Idea: All the arguments for the subsistence of true propositions seem to hold good for the subsistence of false ones. We might even have to find room for absurd or nonsensical ones like 'some round squares are not red-headed'. | |
| From: Gilbert Ryle (Are there propositions? [1930], 'Objections') | |
| A reaction: A particularly nice example of a Category Mistake from the man who made them famous. Why can't we just make belief a proposition attitude, so I equally believe 'sea is blue', 'grass is pink' and 'trees are bifocal', but the status of my belief varies? |
| 1836 | Prudence is more valuable than philosophy, because it avoids confusions of the soul [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: The greatest good in avoiding confusion of the soul is prudence [phronesis], on which account prudence is something more valuable than even philosophy. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 132), quoted by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 10.27 |
| 14061 | Our own choices are autonomous, and the basis for praise and blame [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: What occurs by our own agency is autonomous, and it is to this that praise and blame are attached. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 133) | |
| A reaction: I don't think this should be understand as an assertion of free will in the modern sense. The 'swerve' of the atoms just means that decisions can arise out of us - not that they are somehow outside of nature. |
| 14054 | Fearing death is absurd, because we are not present when it occurs [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: Death, the most frightening of bad things, is nothing to us; since when we exist, death is not yet present, and when death is present, then we do not exist. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 125) | |
| A reaction: This is a fairly accurate observation. To fear not being in this life is a bit like fearing not being in Vancouver next Tuesday. It also involves the paradox of the present moment. E.g. Idea 1904. |
| 14053 | It is absurd to fear the pain of death when you are not even facing it [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: He is a fool who says that he fears death not because it will be painful when present but because it is painful when it is still to come. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 125) | |
| A reaction: Not very plausible, I'm afraid. It provides a good argument in favour of smoking, if the lung cancer is far in the future. Paralysing fear is daft, but some remote fears should be heeded. |
| 14055 | The wisdom that produces a good life also produces a good death [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: The same kind of practice produces a good life and a good death. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 126) | |
| A reaction: This is the kind of old fashioned observation which we would do well to hang on to. The ideal of dying well has vanished from our culture. |
| 14057 | All pleasures are good, but it is not always right to choose them [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: Every pleasure is a good thing, since it has a nature congenial to us, but not every one is to be chosen, just as every pain is a bad thing, but not every one is such as to be always avoided. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 129) | |
| A reaction: This kind of sensible remark would be wholly endorsed by Bentham and Mill. This fits in with the excellent distinction between what is right and what is good. |
| 14058 | Pleasure is the goal, but as lack of pain and calm mind, not as depraved or greedy pleasure [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: When we say that pleasure is the goal we do not mean the pleasures of the profligate or the pleasures of consumption, but rather the lack of pain in the body and disturbance in the soul. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 131) | |
| A reaction: I don't really understand the aspiration to a 'calm mind'. No one likes stress, but total calmness sounds close to non-existence. The mean! There is no achievement without pain. |
| 1833 | Pleasure is the first good in life [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: Pleasure is the beginning and end of living happily, and we recognise this as the first good. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 128) | |
| A reaction: We might enquire what we would live for if our capacities for pleasure were surgically removed. Would we still experience intellectual curiosity, or an aspiration to some cold and remote goodness? |
| 14063 | Sooner a good decision going wrong, than a bad one turning out for the good [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: It is better for a good decision not to turn out right in action than for a bad decision to turn out right because of chance. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 135) | |
| A reaction: This sounds right, and on the whole the law agrees. Notice that what we need is a 'good decision', and not just to 'mean well'. The well-meaning fool is wicked. I am opposed to consequentialism, and agree with this idea. |
| 14059 | The best life is not sensuality, but rational choice and healthy opinion [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: It is not drinking bouts or enjoying boys and women or consuming fish which produces the pleasant life, but sober calculation which searches out reasons for every choice, and drives out opinions which produce turmoil of the soul. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 132) | |
| A reaction: This more or less sums up what I would call the philosophical life. Spontaneity is good, and some pleasures are killed by excessive thought, but on the whole actions are always better if good reasons are found, and error brings chaos. |
| 1835 | True pleasure is not debauchery, but freedom from physical and mental pain [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: When we say that pleasure is the chief good, we do not mean debauchery, but freedom of the body from pain, and of the soul from confusion…. which requires sober contemplation. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 131), quoted by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 10.27 | |
| A reaction: I'm not clear how lack of pain and confusion counts as pleasure. Also the concepts of debauchery held by the puritan and the sybarite are wildly different. |
| 14056 | We only need pleasure when we have the pain of desire [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: We are in need of pleasure only when we are in pain because of the absence of pleasure, and when we are not in pain, then we no longer need pleasure. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 128) | |
| A reaction: This Buddhist aspiration to eliminate desire has no appeal for me. It just sounds like a recipe for boredom, and an aversion to risk-taking. Start by asking what is best in life; it inevitably involves pleasure of some sort. Anyway, desire isn't painful. |
| 14060 | Prudence is the greatest good, and more valuable than philosophy, because it produces virtue [Epicurus] |
| Full Idea: Prudence is the principle of the rational life and is the greatest good. That is why prudence is more valuable than philosophy, for prudence is the source of all the other virtues. | |
| From: Epicurus (Letter to Menoeceus [c.291 BCE], 132) | |
| A reaction: ['prudence' will be Greek 'phronesis']The interest of this is that it is almost copied straight out of Aristotle's Ethics. Epicurus was an opponent of the Peripatetics, but greatly influenced by them. |
| 3062 | There are no causes, because they are relative, and alike things can't cause one another [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: The idea of cause is relative to that of which it is the cause, and so has no real existence. …Also cause must either be body causing body, or incorporeal causing incorporeal, and neither of these is possible. | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.11.11 |
| 3063 | Motion can't move where it is, and can't move where it isn't, so it can't exist [Pyrrho, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Motion is not moved in the place in which it is is, and it is impossible that it should be moved in the place in which it is not, so there is no such thing as motion. | |
| From: report of Pyrrho (reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.11.11 |