64 ideas
| 22309 | An idea can only be like another idea [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: An idea can be like nothing but an idea. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §08), quoted by Michael Potter - The Rise of Analytic Philosophy 1879-1930 43 'Mean' | |
| A reaction: I take this to be relevant to the correspondence theory, but also to be one of Berkeley's best observations. We understand ideas, but we can't map them onto the world (because they are not maps!). ...But then how is one idea like another? Hm. |
| 6717 | Abstract ideas are impossible [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: We have, I think, shown the impossibility of Abstract Ideas. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], Intro §21) | |
| A reaction: He achieves this by an attack on universals, offering the nominalist view that there are only particulars. There seems to be a middle ground, where universals don't actually exist, but there are settled conventional abstraction, beyond particulars. |
| 18876 | Berkeley does believe in trees, but is confused about what trees are [Berkeley, by Cameron] |
| Full Idea: I think that we should consider Berkeley as believing in trees; we should simply claim that he has false beliefs about what trees are. | |
| From: report of George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710]) by Ross P. Cameron - Truthmakers, Realism and Ontology 'Realism' | |
| A reaction: I can be realist about spots before my eyes, or a ringing in my ears, but be (quite sensibly) unsure about what they are, so Cameron's suggestion sounds plausible. |
| 6715 | Universals do not have single meaning, but attach to many different particulars [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: There is no such thing as one precise and definite signification annexed to any general name, they all signifying indifferently a great number of particular ideas. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], Intro §18) | |
| A reaction: The term 'red' may be assigned to a range of colours, but we also recognise the precision of 'that red'. For 'electron', or 'three', or 'straight', the particulars are indistinguishable. |
| 6719 | No one will think of abstractions if they only have particular ideas [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: He that knows he has no other than particular ideas, will not puzzle himself in vain to find out and conceive the abstract idea annexed to any name. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], Intro §24) | |
| A reaction: A nice point against universals. Maybe gods only think in particulars. One particular on its own could never suggest a universal. How are you going to spot patterns if you don't think in universals? Maths needs patterns. |
| 6714 | Universals do not have any intrinsic properties, but only relations to particulars [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: Universality, so far as I can comprehend it, does not consist in the absolute, positive nature or conception of anything, but in the relation it bears to the particulars signified or represented by it. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], Intro §15) | |
| A reaction: I always think it is a basic principle in philosophy that some sort of essence must precede relations (and functions). What is it about universals that enables them to have a relation to particulars? |
| 6729 | Material substance is just general existence which can have properties [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: The most accurate philosophers have no other meaning annexed to 'material substance' but the idea of being in general, together with the relative notion of its supporting accidents. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §17) | |
| A reaction: This is part of the attack on Aristotle's concept of 'substance', and is a nice way of dissolving the concept. 'Substance' will never reappear in physics, but modern philosopher have returned to it, as possibly inescapable in metaphysics. |
| 16636 | A die has no distinct subject, but is merely a name for its modes or accidents [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: To me a die seems to be nothing distinct from those things which are termed its modes or accidents. And to say a die is hard, extended and square is not to attribute those qualities to a distinct subject, but only an explication of the word 'die'. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], n 49) | |
| A reaction: This is apparently a reaction to Locke, and a final rejection of the medieval idea of a 'substance'. Unfortunately it leaves Berkeley with a 'bundle' view of objects (a typical empiricist account), which is even worse. |
| 6722 | Perception is existence for my table, but also possible perception, by me or a spirit [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: The table I write on I say exists, that is, I see and feel it; and if I were out of my study I should say it existed - meaning thereby that if I was in my study I might perceive it, or that some other spirit actually does perceive it. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §3) | |
| A reaction: Berkeley is always (understandably) labelled as an 'idealist', but this seems to be what we call 'phenomenalism', because it allows possible experiences as well as actual ones. See Ideas 5170 and 6522. |
| 6723 | The 'esse' of objects is 'percipi', and they can only exist in minds [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: The absolute existence of unthinking things with no relation to their being perceived is unintelligible to me; their 'esse' is 'percipi', nor is it possible they should have any existence out of the minds or thinking things which perceive them. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §3) | |
| A reaction: "Esse est percipi" (to be is to be perceived) is the well-known slogan associated with Berkeley. I cannot see how Berkeley can assert that the separate existence of things is impossible. He is the classic confuser of epistemology and ontology. |
| 6732 | When I shut my eyes, the things I saw may still exist, but in another mind [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: When I shut my eyes, the things I saw may still exist, but it must be in another mind. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §90) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as ridiculous. What kind of theory says that a table goes out of existence when someone forgets to look at it for a moment, but is then recreated in identical form? Epistemology is not ontology. |
| 6724 | The only substance is spirit, or that which perceives [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: It is evident that there is not any other Substance than spirit, or that which perceives. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §7) | |
| A reaction: Weird. To say that this is 'evident' seems to be begging the question. Why should he assume that there is nothing more to reality than his perception of it? He seems strangely unimaginative. |
| 6726 | No one can, by abstraction, conceive extension and motion of bodies without sensible qualities [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: I desire any one to reflect and try whether he can, by any abstraction of thought, conceive the extension and motion of a body without any sensible qualities. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §10) | |
| A reaction: The rather geometrical view of objects found in Descartes and Russell is an attempt to do this. I don't think the fact that we can't really achieve it matters much. We divide primary from secondary qualities in our understanding, not in experience. |
| 6727 | Figure and extension seem just as dependent on the observer as heat and cold [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: If heat and cold are only affections of the mind (since the same body seems cold to one hand and warm to the other), why may we not argue that figure and extension also appear different to the same eye at different stations? | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §14) | |
| A reaction: If the assessment of the qualities of an object is entirely a matter of our experiences of it, there is no denying Berkeley on this. However, judgement goes beyond experience, into speculations, inferences, and explanations. |
| 6728 | Motion is in the mind, since swifter ideas produce an appearance of slower motion [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: Is it not reasonable to say that motion is not without the mind, since if the succession of ideas in the mind become swifter the motion, it is acknowledged, shall appear slower without any alteration in any external object. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §14) | |
| A reaction: An intriguing argument, based on what is now the principle of slow-motion photography. Fast minds slow down movement, like great tennis players. By what right does Berkeley say that the external subject is unaltered? |
| 6495 | Berkeley's idealism resulted from fear of scepticism in representative realism [Robinson,H on Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: It was fear of scepticism based upon representative realism that motivated Berkeley's idealism. | |
| From: comment on George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710]) by Howard Robinson - Perception II.1 | |
| A reaction: Personally I side with Russell, who accepts representative realism, and also accepts that some degree of scepticism is unavoidable, but without getting excited about it. The key to everything is to be a 'fallibilist' about knowledge. |
| 6720 | Knowledge is of ideas from senses, or ideas of the mind, or operations on sensations [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: The objects of knowledge are either ideas imprinted on the senses, or passions and operations of the mind, or ideas (formed by memory and imagination) compounding, dividing or barely representing the original perceptions. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §1) | |
| A reaction: This is the germ of Hume's 'associations' (Idea 2189). There is not much room here for synthetic a priori knowledge, as the a priori part seems to merely know the mind. Most of Russell's epistemology is contained in the last part of the sentence. |
| 23636 | Berkeley's idealism gives no grounds for believing in other minds [Reid on Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: I can find no principle in Berkeley's system, which affords me even probable ground to conclude that there are other intelligent beings, like myself. | |
| From: comment on George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710]) by Thomas Reid - Essays on Intellectual Powers 2: Senses 10 | |
| A reaction: I agree, which means that Berkeley's position seems to entail solipsism, unless God is the Cartesian deus ex machina who rescues him from this wall of ignorance. |
| 6736 | I know other minds by ideas which are referred by me to other agents, as their effects [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: The knowledge I have of other spirits is not immediate, as is the knowledge of my ideas; but depending on the intervention of ideas, by me referred to agents or spirits distinct from myself, as effects or concomitant signs. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §145) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as gross intellectual dishonesty, since the argument Berkeley uses to assert other minds could equally be used to assert the existence of tables ('by me referred to agents distinct from myself, as effects'). Be a solipsist or a realist. |
| 6713 | If animals have ideas, and are not machines, they must have some reason [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: If the brutes have any ideas at all, and are not bare machines (as some would have them), we cannot deny them to have some reason. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], Intro §11) | |
| A reaction: It seems possible to imagine a low level of mind, where a few ideas (or concepts) float around, but hardly anything worth the name of reason. However, a Darwinian view suggests that concepts must bestow an advantage, so the two go together. |
| 6491 | Berkeley replaced intentionality with an anti-abstractionist imagist theory of thought [Berkeley, by Robinson,H] |
| Full Idea: By Berkeley - with his anti-abstractionism and imagist theory of thought - the classical sense-datum conception was firmly established, and intentionality had disappeared as an intrinsic property, not only of perceptual states, but of all mental contents. | |
| From: report of George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710]) by Howard Robinson - Perception 1.6 | |
| A reaction: Intentionality was originally a medieval concept, and was revived by Brentano in the late nineteenth century. Nowadays intentionality is taken for granted, but I still suspect that we could drop it, and talk of nothing but brain states caused by reality. |
| 6711 | The mind creates abstract ideas by considering qualities separated from their objects [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: We are told that the mind being able to consider each quality of things singly, or abstracted from those other qualities with which it is united, does by that means frame to itself abstract ideas. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], Intro §7) | |
| A reaction: A helpful explanation of 'abstract' ideas. Berkeley gives colour and movement as examples. Fodor suggests that abstraction is the key strategy in empiricist epistemology. The difficulty is to decide whether the qualities are natural or conventional. |
| 10581 | I can only combine particulars in imagination; I can't create 'abstract' ideas [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: Whether others can abstract their ideas, they best can tell. For myself, I find I have a faculty of imagining, or representing to myself, only the idea of those particular things I have perceived, and of compounding and dividing them. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], 10) | |
| A reaction: He is admitting mixing experiences, but always particulars, never abstract. His examples are 'man' and 'motion'. Compare Aristotle Idea 9067. Berkeley is, I think, trapped in a false imagistic view of thought. My image of Plato blurs young and old. |
| 4363 | The word 'person' is useless in ethics, because what counts as a good or bad self-conscious being? [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: An excellent reason for keeping the word 'person' out of ethics is that it is usually so thinly defined that it cannot generate any sense of 'good person'. If a person is just a self-conscious being, what would count as a good or bad one? | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.9 n20) | |
| A reaction: A nice point. Locke's concept of a person (rational self-conscious being) lacks depth and individuality, and Hitler fulfils the criteria as well as any saint. But if Hitler wasn't a 'bad person', what was he bad at being? |
| 6721 | Ideas are perceived by the mind, soul or self [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: The thing which knows or perceives ideas is what I call mind, spirit, soul or myself. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §2) | |
| A reaction: The interest here is in making no distinction between 'mind' and 'self', which seems to ally Berkeley with Locke's view of personal identity, as continuity of consciousness. The addition of 'soul' tries to connect Locke to Christian thought. |
| 6716 | Language is presumably for communication, and names stand for ideas [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: It is a received opinion that language has no other end but the communicating our ideas, and that every significant name stands for an idea. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], Intro §19) | |
| A reaction: This attitude to language has been widely discredited, partly by the observation that 'idea' is very ambiguous, and partly by the fans of meaning-as-use. Truth conditions seem to be ideas, and so are speaker's intentions. |
| 6718 | I can't really go wrong if I stick to wordless thought [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: So long as I confine my thoughts to my own ideas divested of words, I do not see how I can easily be mistaken. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], Intro §22) | |
| A reaction: I think it was one of the great errors of twentieth century philosophy to say that Berkeley cannot do this, because thought needs language. Personally I think language lags along behind most our thinking, tidying up the mess. I believe in propositions. |
| 4355 | There may be inverse akrasia, where the agent's action is better than their judgement recommends [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: There seem to be cases of 'inverse akrasia', in which the course of action actually followed is superior to the course of action recommended by the agent's best judgement. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.7) | |
| A reaction: This must occur, as when an assassin lets his victim off, and then regrets the deed. It strengthens the case against Socrates, and in favour of their being two parts of the soul which compete to motivate our actions. |
| 4325 | Must all actions be caused in part by a desire, or can a belief on its own be sufficient? [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: In contemporary philosophy of action, there is a fervid debate about whether any intentional action must be prompted in part by desire, or whether it is possible to be moved to action by a belief alone. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Intro) | |
| A reaction: I want a cool belief to be sufficient to produce an action, because it will permit at least a Kantian dimension to ethics, and make judgement central, and marginalise emotivism, which is the spawn of Satan. |
| 4351 | It is a fantasy that only through the study of philosophy can one become virtuous [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: It is a fantasy that only through the study of philosophy can one become virtuous. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.6) | |
| A reaction: I personally believe that philosophy is the best route yet devised to the achievement of virtue, but it is clearly not essential. All the philosophers I meet are remarkably virtuous, but that may be a chicken/egg thing. |
| 4329 | After a moral dilemma is resolved there is still a 'remainder', requiring (say) regret [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: When one moral requirement has overriden another in a dilemma, there is still a 'remainder', so that regret, or the recognition of some new requirement, are still appropriate. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: This is a powerful point on behalf of virtue ethics. There is a correct way to feel about the application of rules and calculations. Judges sleep well at night, but virtuous people may not. |
| 4330 | Deontologists resolve moral dilemmas by saying the rule conflict is merely apparent [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: With respect to resolvable dilemmas, the deontologist's strategy is to argue that the 'conflict' between the two rules which has generated the dilemma is merely apparent. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: This assumes that the rules can't conflict (because they come for God, or pure reason), but we might say that there are correct rules which do conflict. Morality isn't physics, or tennis. |
| 4341 | Involuntary actions performed in tragic dilemmas are bad because they mar a good life [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: The actions a virtuous agent is forced to in tragic dilemmas fail to be good actions because the doing of them, no matter how unwillingly or involuntarily, mars or ruins a good life. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: Of course, only virtuous people have their lives ruined by such things. For the cold or the wicked it is just water off a duck's back. |
| 4340 | You are not a dishonest person if a tragic dilemma forces you to do something dishonest [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: Doing what is, say, dishonest solely in the context of a tragic dilemma does not entail being dishonest, possessing that vice. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.3 n8) | |
| A reaction: This seems right, although it mustn't be thought that the dishonesty is thereby excused. Virtuous people find being dishonest very painful. |
| 4358 | Virtue may be neither sufficient nor necessary for eudaimonia [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: Some critics say virtue is not necessary for eudaimonia (since the wicked sometimes flourish), and others say it is not sufficient (because virtuous behaviour sometimes ruins a life). | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.8) | |
| A reaction: Both criticisms seem wrong (the wicked don't 'flourish', and complete virtue never ruins lives, except in tragic dilemmas). But it is hard to prove them wrong. |
| 4337 | Teenagers are often quite wise about ideals, but rather stupid about consequences [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: Adolescents tend to be much more gormless about consequences than they are about ideals. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.2 n12) | |
| A reaction: Very accurate, I'm afraid. But this cuts both ways. They seem to need education not in virtue, but simply in consequences. |
| 4324 | Animals and plants can 'flourish', but only rational beings can have eudaimonia [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: The trouble with 'flourishing' as a translation of 'eudaimonia' is that animals and even plants can flourish, but eudaimonia is possible only for rational beings. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Intro) | |
| A reaction: 'Flourishing' still seems better than 'happy', which is centrally used now to refer to a state of mind, not a situation. 'Well being' seems good, and plants are usually permitted that. |
| 4359 | When it comes to bringing up children, most of us think that the virtues are the best bet [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: If you think about bringing up children to prepare them for life, rather than converting the wicked or convincing the moral sceptic, isn't virtue the most reliable bet? | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.8) | |
| A reaction: A very convincing idea. They haven't the imagination to grasp consequences properly, or sufficient abstract thought to grasp principles, or the political cunning to negotiate contracts, but they can grasp ideals of what a good person is like. |
| 4336 | Any strict ranking of virtues or rules gets abandoned when faced with particular cases [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: Any codification ranking the virtues, like any codification ranking the rules, is bound to come up against cases where we will want to change the rankings. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: This seems right, and yet it feels like a slippery slope. Am I supposed to be virtuous and wise, but have no principles? Infinite flexibility can lead straight to wickedness. Even the wise need something to hang on to. |
| 4334 | Virtue ethics is open to the objection that it fails to show priority among the virtues [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: One criticism of virtue ethics is that it lamentably fails to come up with a priority ranking of the virtues. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: However, one might refer to man's essential function, or characteristic function, and one might derive the virtues of a good citizen from the nature of a good society. |
| 4361 | Good animals can survive, breed, feel characteristic pleasure and pain, and contribute to the group [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: A good social animal is well fitted for 1) individual survival, 2) continuance of its species, 3) characteristic freedom from pain and enjoyment, and 4) good characteristic functioning of its social group. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.9) | |
| A reaction: This feels right, but brings out the characteristic conservativism of virtue theory. A squirrel which can recite Shakespeare turns out to be immoral. |
| 4349 | Virtuous people may not be fully clear about their reasons for action [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: Virtue must surely be compatible with a fair amount of inarticulacy about one's reasons for action. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.6) | |
| A reaction: Virtuous people may be unclear, but we are entitled to hope for clarification from moral philosophers. The least we can hope for is some distinction between virtue and vice. |
| 4352 | Performing an act simply because it is virtuous is sufficient to be 'morally motivated' or 'dutiful' [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: Acting virtuously, in the way the virtuous agent acts, namely from virtue, is sufficient for being 'morally motivated' or acting 'from a sense of duty'. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.7) | |
| A reaction: Fine, but it invites the question of WHY virtue is motivating, just as one can ask this of maximum happiness, or duty, or even satisfaction of selfish desires. |
| 4353 | If moral motivation is an all-or-nothing sense of duty, how can children act morally? [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: If you are inclined to think that 'moral motivation', acting because you think it is right, must be an all-or-nothing matter, its presence determined by the agent's mind at the moment of acting, do, please, remember children. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.7) | |
| A reaction: I agree about the vital importance of remembering children when discussing morality. However, Kantians might legitimately claim that when a child is simply trained to behave well, it has not yet reached the age of true morality. |
| 4346 | The emotions of sympathy, compassion and love are no guarantee of right action or acting well [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: The emotions of sympathy, compassion and love are no guarantee of right action or acting well. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.4) | |
| A reaction: This is a critique of Hume, and of utlitarianism. It pushes us either to the concept of duty, or the concept of virtue (independent of right feeling). |
| 4339 | According to virtue ethics, two agents may respond differently, and yet both be right [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: According to virtue ethics, in a given situation two different agents may do what is right, what gets a tick of approval, despite the fact that each fails to do what the other did. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: You could certainly have great respect for two entirely different decisions about a medical dilemma, if they both showed integrity and good will, even if one had worse consequences than the other. |
| 4354 | Maybe in a deeply poisoned character none of their milder character traits could ever be a virtue [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: I am prepare to stick my neck out and say that extreme Nazis or racists (say) have poisoned characters to such an extent that none of their character traits could ever count as a virtue. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.7) | |
| A reaction: Hard to justify, but it is hard to respect a mass murderer because they seem to love their dog or the beauty of music or flowers. They can't possibly appreciate the Platonic Form of love or beauty? |
| 4356 | We are puzzled by a person who can show an exceptional virtue and also behave very badly [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: That we have some intuitive belief in the unity of the virtues is shown by our reaction to stories of a person who has shown an exceptional virtue, but also done something morally repellent. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.7) | |
| A reaction: A nice observation, but not enough to establish the unity of virtue. People tend to love all virtue, but it is not obviously impossible to love selected virtues and despise others (e.g. love courage, and despise charity). |
| 4364 | Being unusually virtuous in some areas may entail being less virtuous in others [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: It may well be that being particularly well endowed with respect to some virtues inevitably involves being not very well endowed in others. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.9) | |
| A reaction: Maybe, but this sound a bit like an excuse. Newton wasn't very nice, but Einstein was. I can't believe in a finite reservoir of virtue. |
| 4327 | Deontologists do consider consequences, because they reveal when a rule might apply [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: Though it is sometimes said that deontologists 'take no account of consequences', this is manifestly false, for many actions we deliberate about only fall under rules or principles when we bring in their predicted consequences. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.1) | |
| A reaction: An important defence of deontology, which otherwise is vulnerable to the 'well-meaning fool' problem. It is no good having a good will, but refusing to think about consequences. |
| 4335 | 'Codifiable' morality give rules for decisions which don't require wisdom [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: If morality is strongly 'codifiable', it should consist of rules which provide a decision procedure, and it should be equally applicable by the virtuous and the non-virtuous, without recourse to wisdom. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: A key idea. Religions want obedience, and Kant wants morality to be impersonal, and most people want morality which simple uneducated people can follow. And yet how can wisdom ever be irrelevant? |
| 4328 | Preference utilitarianism aims to be completely value-free, or empirical [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: There are some forms of utilitarianism which aim to be entirely 'value-free' or empirical, such as those which define happiness in terms of the satisfaction of actual desires or preferences, regardless of their content. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.1) | |
| A reaction: This point makes it clear that preference utilitarianism is a doomed enterprise. For a start I can prefer not to be a utilitarian. You can only maximise something if you value if. Are preferences valuable? |
| 4338 | Deontologists usually accuse utilitarians of oversimplifying hard cases [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: Deontologists characteristically maintain that utilitarians have made out a particular hard case to be too simple. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: Utilitarianism certainly seems to ignore the anguish of hard dilemmas, but that is supposed to be its appeal. If you think for too long, every dilemma begins to seem hopeless. |
| 4343 | We are torn between utilitarian and deontological views of lying, depending on the examples [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: Utilitarianism says there is nothing intrinsically wrong with lying, but examples of bare-faced lying to increase happiness drive us to deontology; but then examples where telling the truth has appalling consequences drive us back to utilitarianism again. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: A nice illustration of why virtue theory suddenly seemed appealing. Deontology can cope, though, by seeing other duties when the consequences are dreadful. |
| 4365 | We are distinct from other animals in behaving rationally - pursuing something as good, for reasons [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: Our characteristic way of going on, which distinguishes us from all the other species of animals, is a rational way, which is any way we can rightly see as good, as something we have reason to do. | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch10) | |
| A reaction: Some people more than others, and none of us all the time. Romantics see rationality as a restraint on the authentic emotional and animal life. 'Be a good animal'. However, I agree. |
| 6731 | No one can explain how matter affects mind, so matter is redundant in philosophy [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: How matter should operate on a spirit, or produce any idea in it, is what no philosopher will pretend to explain; it is therefore evident there can be no use of matter in natural philosophy. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §50) | |
| A reaction: An intriguing argument for idealism, which starts in Cartesian dualism, but then discards the physical world because of the notorious interaction problem. Of course, if he had thought that matter and spirit were one (Spinoza) the problem vanishes. |
| 6730 | We discover natural behaviour by observing settled laws of nature, not necessary connections [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: That food nourishes, sleep refreshes, and fire warms us; all this we know, not by discovering any necessary connexion between our ideas, but only by the observation of the settled laws of nature. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §31) | |
| A reaction: Hume is famous for this idea, but it is found in Hobbes too (Idea 2364), and is the standard empiricist view of causation. The word 'settled' I take to imply that the laws are contingent, because they could become unsettled at any time. |
| 15861 | The laws of nature are mental regularities which we learn by experience [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: The set rules or established methods wherein the Mind we depend on excites in us the ideas of sense, are called the 'laws of nature'; and these we learn by experience, which teaches us that such and such ideas are attended with certain other ideas. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], 33) | |
| A reaction: He observes that the ideas of sense are more regular than other mental events, and attributes the rules to an Author. He is giving the standard empirical Humean view, with his own quirky idealist slant. |
| 6734 | If properties and qualities arise from an inward essence, we will remain ignorant of nature [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: An inducement to pronouncing ourselves ignorant of the nature of things is the opinion that everything includes within itself the cause of its properties; or that there is in each object an inward essence which is the source whence its qualities flow. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §102) | |
| A reaction: This remains a good objection to essentialism - that while it remains quite a plausible picture of how nature operates, it makes the task of understanding nature hopeless. We can grasp imposed regular laws, but not secret inner essences. |
| 6735 | All motion is relative, so a single body cannot move [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: There cannot be any motion other than relative; …if there was one only body in being it could not possibly move. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §112) | |
| A reaction: This seems to agree with with Leibniz in denying the Newton-Clarke idea of absolute space. See Idea 2100. Suppose there were two bodies racing towards one another, when one of them suddenly vanished? |
| 6733 | I cannot imagine time apart from the flow of ideas in my mind [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: Whenever I attempt to frame a simple idea of time, abstracted from the succession of ideas in my mind, which flows uniformly and is participated in by all beings, I am lost and embrangled in inextricable difficulties. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §98) | |
| A reaction: 'Embrangled'! A nice statement of the idealist view of time, as entirely mental. I know what he means. However, surely he can manage to imagine a movement which continues when he shuts he eyes? Try blinking during a horse race. |
| 5994 | Is the cosmos open or closed, mechanical or teleological, alive or inanimate, and created or eternal? [Robinson,TM, by PG] |
| Full Idea: The four major disputes in classical cosmology were whether the cosmos is 'open' or 'closed', whether it is explained mechanistically or teleologically, whether it is alive or mere matter, and whether or not it has a beginning. | |
| From: report of T.M. Robinson (Classical Cosmology (frags) [1997]) by PG - Db (ideas) | |
| A reaction: A nice summary. The standard modern view is closed, mechanistic, inanimate and non-eternal. But philosophers can ask deeper questions than physicists, and I say we are entitled to speculate when the evidence runs out. |
| 4350 | If people are virtuous in obedience to God, would they become wicked if they lost their faith? [Hursthouse] |
| Full Idea: If people perform virtuous actions simply because they are commanded by God, would they cease to perform such actions if they lost their faith in God? | |
| From: Rosalind Hursthouse (On Virtue Ethics [1999], Ch.6) | |
| A reaction: To be consistent, the answer might be 'yes', but that invites the response that only intrinsically evil people need to be Christians. The rest of us can be good without it. |
| 6737 | Particular evils are really good when linked to the whole system of beings [Berkeley] |
| Full Idea: Those particular things which, considered in themselves, appear to be evil, have the nature of good, when considered as linked with the whole system of beings. | |
| From: George Berkeley (The Principles of Human Knowledge [1710], §153) | |
| A reaction: This wildly contradicts the rest of Berkeley's philosophy, which is strictly empiricist, and rests wholly on actual experience. What experience does he have of the 'whole system of beings', and its making evil into actual good? |