Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Philosophical Explanations', 'Foucault: a very short introduction' and 'Reply to Fifth Objections'

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     specify just one area for these texts


9 ideas

1. Philosophy / C. History of Philosophy / 4. Later European Philosophy / d. Nineteenth century philosophy
Since Kant, self-criticism has been part of philosophy [Gutting]
     Full Idea: Philosophy after Kant has involved a continuing critique of its own project.
     From: Gary Gutting (Foucault: a very short introduction [2005], 6)
     A reaction: I'm struck by many modern philosophers in the analytic tradition who write as if Kant had never existed. I don't know if that is a conscious decision, but it may be a good one.
1. Philosophy / H. Continental Philosophy / 4. Linguistic Structuralism
Structuralism describes human phenomena in terms of unconscious structures [Gutting]
     Full Idea: Structuralism in the 1960s was a set of theories which explained human phenomena in terms of underlying unconscious structures, rather than the lived experience described by Phenomenology.
     From: Gary Gutting (Foucault: a very short introduction [2005], 6)
     A reaction: Hence the interest in Freud and Marx, and Foucault's interest in history, each offering to unmask what is hidden in consciousness. The unmasking is a basically Kantian project. Cf. Frege's hatred of 'psychologism'.
9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 2. Substance / a. Substance
Knowing the attributes is enough to reveal a substance [Descartes]
     Full Idea: I have never thought that anything more is required to reveal a substance than its various attributes.
     From: René Descartes (Reply to Fifth Objections [1641], 360)
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 4. Belief / c. Aim of beliefs
Maybe knowledge is belief which 'tracks' the truth [Nozick, by Williams,M]
     Full Idea: Nozick suggests that knowledge is just belief which 'tracks the truth' (hence leaving out justification).
     From: report of Robert Nozick (Philosophical Explanations [1981]) by Michael Williams - Problems of Knowledge Ch. 2
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 3. Innate Knowledge / a. Innate knowledge
Our thinking about external things doesn't disprove the existence of innate ideas [Descartes]
     Full Idea: You can't prove that Praxiteles never made any statues on the grounds that he did not get from within himself the marble from which he sculpted them.
     From: René Descartes (Reply to Fifth Objections [1641], 362)
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 4. Tracking the Facts
A true belief isn't knowledge if it would be believed even if false. It should 'track the truth' [Nozick, by Dancy,J]
     Full Idea: Nozick says Gettier cases aren't knowledge because the proposition would be believed even if false. Proper justification must be more sensitive to the truth ("track the truth").
     From: report of Robert Nozick (Philosophical Explanations [1981], 3.1) by Jonathan Dancy - Intro to Contemporary Epistemology 3.1
     A reaction: This is a bad idea. I see a genuine tree in my garden and believe it is there, so I know it. That I might have believed it if I was in virtually reality, or observing a mirror, won't alter that.
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 2. Origin of Concepts / c. Nativist concepts
A blind man may still contain the idea of colour [Descartes]
     Full Idea: How do you know that there is no idea of colour in a man born blind?
     From: René Descartes (Reply to Fifth Objections [1641], 363)
28. God / B. Proving God / 2. Proofs of Reason / a. Ontological Proof
Possible existence is a perfection in the idea of a triangle [Descartes]
     Full Idea: Possible existence is a perfection in the idea of a triangle, just as necessary existence is a perfection in the idea of God.
     From: René Descartes (Reply to Fifth Objections [1641], 383)
Necessary existence is a property which is uniquely part of God's essence [Descartes]
     Full Idea: In the case of God necessary existence is in fact a property in the strictest sense of the term, since it applies to him alone and forms a part of his essence as it does of no other thing
     From: René Descartes (Reply to Fifth Objections [1641], 383)