11 ideas
22396 | We take courage, temperance, wisdom and justice as moral, but Aristotle takes wisdom as intellectual [Foot] |
Full Idea: For us there are four cardinal moral virtues: courage, temperance, wisdom and justice. But Aristotle and Aquinas call only three of these virtues moral virtues; practical wisdom (phronesis, prudentia) they class with the intellectual virtues. | |
From: Philippa Foot (Virtues and Vices [1978], p.2) | |
A reaction: I'm not sure about 'for us'. How many of us rank temperance as a supreme virtue? Aristotle ranks phronesis (which I think of as 'common sense') as the key enabler of the moral virtues, making it unlike the other intellectual virtues. |
22397 | Wisdom is open to all, and not just to the clever or well trained [Foot] |
Full Idea: Knowledge that can be acquired only by someone who is clever or who has access to special training is not counted as part of wisdom. | |
From: Philippa Foot (Virtues and Vices [1978], p.6) | |
A reaction: Consider Pierre's peasant friend Platon Karatayev in 'War and Peace'. I assume 'special training' rules out anyone with a philosophy degree. |
3979 | The Turing Machine is the best idea yet about how the mind works [Fodor on Turing] |
Full Idea: Alan Turing had (in his theory of the 'Turing Machine') what I suppose is the best thought about how the mind works that anyone has had so far. | |
From: comment on Alan Turing (Computing Machinery and Intelligence [1950]) by Jerry A. Fodor - Jerry A. Fodor on himself p.296 | |
A reaction: I am not convinced, because I don't think rationality is possible without consciousness. The brain may bypass the representations used by a computer. |
5321 | In 50 years computers will successfully imitate humans with a 70% success rate [Turing] |
Full Idea: In about fifty years' time it will be possible to program computers to play the imitation game so well that an average interrogator will not have more than 70% chance of making the right identification after five minutes of questioning. | |
From: Alan Turing (Computing Machinery and Intelligence [1950], p.57), quoted by Robert Kirk - Mind and Body §5.9 | |
A reaction: This is the famous prophecy called 'The Turing Test'. The current state (2004) seems to be that the figure of 70% is very near, but no one sees much prospect of advancing much further in the next 100 years. Dennett sees jokes as a big problem. |
22402 | Most people think virtues can be displayed in bad actions [Foot] |
Full Idea: Hardly anyone sees any difficulty in the thought that virtues may sometimes be displayed in bad actions. The courage of the villain can be spoken of as quite unproblematic. | |
From: Philippa Foot (Virtues and Vices [1978], III) | |
A reaction: She cites Peter Geach as a sole opponent of this view. The courage of the entire German army in WWII seems to fall into this category. The boldness of villains has to impress the virtuous but timid. |
23145 | Virtues are intended to correct design flaws in human beings [Foot, by Driver] |
Full Idea: A popular view (expressed by Philippa Foot) is that the virtues work to 'correct' for the baser human impulses and motives. …Virtues are solutions to design flaws in human beings. | |
From: report of Philippa Foot (Virtues and Vices [1978]) by Julia Driver - The Virtues and Human Nature 1 | |
A reaction: Quite a plausible thought. Not so much design flaws, though, as natural traits of character that suited hunter gatherers but not modern cosmopolitan capitalists. Driver disagrees. |
22401 | Actions can be in accordance with virtue, but without actually being virtuous [Foot] |
Full Idea: Some actions are in accordance with virtue without requiring virtue for their performance, whereas others are both in accordance with virtue and such as to show possession of a virtue. | |
From: Philippa Foot (Virtues and Vices [1978], p.13) | |
A reaction: She cites the case of an honest trader, who is honest because of self-interest. She is disentangling Kant from his daft idea that only dutiful (and reluctant) actions are virtuous. Kant was only thinking of 'in accordance' cases. |
22398 | Virtues are corrective, to resist temptation or strengthen motivation [Foot] |
Full Idea: The virtues are corrective, each one standing at a point at which there is some temptation to be resisted or deficiency of motivation to be made good. | |
From: Philippa Foot (Virtues and Vices [1978], II) | |
A reaction: A beautifully simple and accurate observation, which I don't remember meeting in Aristotle (...though she cites him as saying that virtues concern what is difficult for us). Justice and charity are given as examples of inadequate motivation. |
22403 | Temperance is not a virtue if it results from timidity or excessive puritanism [Foot] |
Full Idea: In some people temperance is not a virtue, but is rather connected with timidity or with a grudging attitude to the acceptance of good things. | |
From: Philippa Foot (Virtues and Vices [1978], III) | |
A reaction: Timidity seems right. The grudging attitude may result from some larger doubts about pleasure, which could be plausible. |
22400 | Courage overcomes the fears which should be overcome, and doesn't overvalue personal safety [Foot] |
Full Idea: The fears that count against a man's courage are those that we think he should overcome, and among them, in a special class, those that reflect the fact that he values his safety too much. | |
From: Philippa Foot (Virtues and Vices [1978], II) | |
A reaction: I think that sentence tells us more accurately what courage is than anything in Aristotle's discussion. Ask yourself which of your fears really ought to be overcome, and particularly beware of over-valuing your own safety. But stay safe if you can! |
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. |