19 ideas
| 6451 | Visual sense data are an inner picture show which represents the world [Blackburn] |
| Full Idea: In the case of vision, sense data are a kind of inner picture show which itself only indirectly represents aspects of the external world. | |
| From: Simon Blackburn (Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy [1994], p.347) | |
| A reaction: I'm unsure whether this is correct. Russell says the 'roughness' of the table is the sense datum. If it is even a possibility that there are unsensed sense-data, then they cannot be an aspect of the mind, as Blackburn is suggesting they are. |
| 2866 | A true belief might be based on a generally reliable process that failed on this occasion [Blackburn] |
| Full Idea: Reliabilism is open to the counterexample that a belief may be the result of some generally reliable process (a pressure gauge) which was in fact malfunctioning on this occasion, when we would be reluctant to attribute knowledge to the subject. | |
| From: Simon Blackburn (Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy [1994], p.327) | |
| A reaction: Russell's stopped clock that tells the right time twice a day. A good objection. Coming from a reliable source is very good criterion for good justification, but it needs critical assessment. |
| 7535 | If all beliefs are propositional, then belief and judgement are the same thing [Monk] |
| Full Idea: Whether the words 'belief' and 'judgement' mean the same thing is a moot point. Traditionally, a judgement is the assent of mind to a proposition. If one thinks that all beliefs are propositional, then beliefs and judgements are the same thing. | |
| From: Ray Monk (Bertrand Russell: Spirit of Solitude [1996], Ch.19 n6) | |
| A reaction: If I think I have put a bit too much toothpaste on my brush, that strikes me as a non-propositional judgement, even though it could be spelled out as a proposition. But it also strikes me as a belief. |
| 2864 | The main objection to intuitionism in ethics is that intuition is a disguise for prejudice or emotion [Blackburn] |
| Full Idea: Critics say that intuitionism in ethics explains nothing, but may merely function as a disguise for prejudice or passion. | |
| From: Simon Blackburn (Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy [1994], p.198) | |
| A reaction: If someone claims to have an important moral intuition about something, you should carefully assess the person who has the intuition. I would trust some people a lot. |
| 23110 | Human injustice is not a permanent feature of communities [Rawls] |
| Full Idea: Men's propensity to injustice is not a permanent aspect of community life. | |
| From: John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972], p.245), quoted by John Kekes - Against Liberalism | |
| A reaction: This attitude is dismissed by Kekes, with some justification, as naïve optimism. What could be Rawls's grounds for making such a claim? It couldn't be the facts of human history. |
| 2865 | Critics of prescriptivism observe that it is consistent to accept an ethical verdict but refuse to be bound by it [Blackburn] |
| Full Idea: Critics of prescriptivism have noted the problem that whilst accepting a command seems tantamount to setting oneself to obey it, accepting an ethical verdict is, unfortunately, consistent with refusing to be bound by it. | |
| From: Simon Blackburn (Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy [1994], p.300) | |
| A reaction: We nearly all of us accept that our behaviour should be better than it actually is, so we accept the oughts but fail to act. Actually 'refusing', though, sounds a bit contradictory. |
| 15676 | Rawls defends the priority of right over good [Rawls, by Finlayson] |
| Full Idea: Rawls defends the thesis of the priority of the right over the good. | |
| From: report of John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972]) by James Gordon Finlayson - Habermas Ch.7:100 | |
| A reaction: It depends whether you are talking about actions, or about states of affairs. I don't see how any state of affairs can be preferred to the good one. It may be that the highest duty of action is to do what is right, rather than to achieve what is good. |
| 4123 | A fair arrangement is one that parties can agree to without knowing how it will benefit them personally [Rawls, by Williams,B] |
| Full Idea: Rawls's theory is an elaboration of a simple idea: a fair system of arrangements is one that the parties can agree to without knowing how it will benefit them personally. | |
| From: report of John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972]) by Bernard Williams - Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: The essence of modern Kantian contractualism. It is an appealing principle for building a rational world, but I hear Nietzsche turning in his grave. |
| 3279 | Utilitarianism inappropriately scales up the individual willingness to make sacrifices [Rawls, by Nagel] |
| Full Idea: Rawls claims that utilitarianism applies to the problem of many interests a method appropriate for one individual. A single person may accept disadvantages in exchange for benefits, but in society other people get the benefits. | |
| From: report of John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972], p.74,104) by Thomas Nagel - Equality §7 |
| 3280 | Why does the rational agreement of the 'Original Position' in Rawls make it right? [Nagel on Rawls] |
| Full Idea: Why does what it is rational to agree to in Rawls' 'Original Position' determine what is right? | |
| From: comment on John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972]) by Thomas Nagel - Equality §7 |
| 20552 | The original position models the idea that citizens start as free and equal [Rawls, by Swift] |
| Full Idea: The original position is presented by Rawls as modelling the sense in which citizens are to be understood as free and equal. | |
| From: report of John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972]) by Adam Swift - Political Philosophy (3rd ed) 3 'Strikes' | |
| A reaction: In other words, Rawls's philosophy is not a demonstration of why we should be liberals, but a guidebook for how liberals should go about organising society. |
| 18636 | Choose justice principles in ignorance of your own social situation [Rawls] |
| Full Idea: The principles of justice are chosen behind a veil of ignorance. ...Since all are similarly situated and no one is able to design principles to favor his particular condition, the principles of justice are the rest of a fair agreement or bargain. | |
| From: John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972], §03) | |
| A reaction: A famous idea. It tries to impose a Kantian impartiality onto the assessment of political principles. It is a beautifully simple idea, and saying that such impartiality never occurs is no objection to it. Think of a planet far far away. |
| 18631 | All desirable social features should be equal, unless inequality favours the disadvantaged [Rawls] |
| Full Idea: All social primary goods - liberty and opportunity, income and wealth, and the bases of self-respect - are to be distributed equally unless an unequal distribution of any or all of these goods is to the advantage of the least favoured. | |
| From: John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972], §46) | |
| A reaction: In the wholehearted capitalism of the 21st century this sounds like cloud-cuckoo land. As an 'initial position' (just as in the 'Republic') the clean slate brings out some interesting principles. Actual politics takes vested interests as axiomatic. |
| 20538 | Utilitarians lump persons together; Rawls somewhat separates them; Nozick wholly separates them [Swift on Rawls] |
| Full Idea: Rawls objects to utilitarianism because it fails to take seriously the separateness of persons (because there is no overall person to enjoy the overall happiness). But Nozick thinks Rawls does not take the separateness of persons seriously enough. | |
| From: comment on John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972]) by Adam Swift - Political Philosophy (3rd ed) 1 'Nozick' | |
| A reaction: In this sense, Nozick seems to fit our picture of a liberal more closely than Rawls does. I think they both exaggerate the separateness of persons, based on a false concept of human nature. |
| 9277 | Rawls's account of justice relies on conventional fairness, avoiding all moral controversy [Gray on Rawls] |
| Full Idea: Rawls's account of justice works only with widely accepted intuitions of fairness and relies at no point on controversial positions in ethics. The fruit of this modesty is a pious commentary on conventional moral beliefs. | |
| From: comment on John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972]) by John Gray - Straw Dogs 3.6 | |
| A reaction: Presumably this is the thought which provoked Nozick to lob his grenade on the subject. It resembles the charges of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche against Kant, that he was just dressing up conventional morality. Are 'controversial' ethics good? |
| 20527 | Liberty Principle: everyone has an equal right to liberties, if compatible with others' liberties [Rawls] |
| Full Idea: First Principle [Liberty]: Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive total system of equal basic liberties compatible with a similar system of liberty for all. | |
| From: John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972], 46) | |
| A reaction: This is the result of consensus after the initial ignorant position of assessment. It is characteristic of liberalism. I'm struggling to think of a disagreement. |
| 21018 | The social contract has problems with future generations, national boundaries, disabilities and animals [Rawls, by Nussbaum] |
| Full Idea: Rawls saw four difficulties for justice in the social contract approach: future generations; justice across national boundaries; fair treatment of people with disabilities; and moral issues involving non-human animals. | |
| From: report of John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972]) by Martha Nussbaum - Creating Capabilities 4 | |
| A reaction: These are all classic examples of groups who do not have sufficient power to negotiate contracts. |
| 21041 | Justice concerns not natural distributions, or our born location, but what we do about them [Rawls] |
| Full Idea: The natural distribution is neither just nor unjust; nor is it unjust that persons are born into society at some particular position. These are simply natural facts. What is just and unjust is the way that institutions deal with these facts. | |
| From: John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972], 17) | |
| A reaction: Lovely quotation. There is no point in railing against the given, and that includes what is given by history, as well as what is given by nature. It comes down to intervening, in history and in nature. How much intervention will individuals tolerate? |
| 23583 | If an aggression is unjust, the constraints on how it is fought are much stricter [Rawls] |
| Full Idea: When a country's right to war is questionable and uncertain, the constraints on the means it can use are all the more severe. | |
| From: John Rawls (A Theory of Justice [1972], p.379), quoted by Michael Walzer - Just and Unjust Wars 14 | |
| A reaction: This is Rawls opposing the idea that combatants are moral equals. The restraints are, of course, moral. In practice aggressors are usually the worst behaved. |