8 ideas
| 7771 | We need 'events' to explain adverbs, which are adjectival predicates of events [Davidson, by Lycan] |
| Full Idea: To deal with the truth conditions for some adverbs, Davidson introduced a domain of 'events', and made adverbs into adjectival predicates of events. | |
| From: report of Donald Davidson (The Logical Form of Action Sentences [1967]) by William Lycan - Philosophy of Language Ch.9 | |
| A reaction: This seems to be a striking case of a procedure of which I heartily disapprove - deriving you ontology from your semantics. Do all languages have adverbs? |
| 8860 | Language-learning is not good enough evidence for the existence of events [Yablo on Davidson] |
| Full Idea: One needs a better reason for believing in events than the help they provide with language-learning. | |
| From: comment on Donald Davidson (The Logical Form of Action Sentences [1967], §8) by Stephen Yablo - Apriority and Existence §8 | |
| A reaction: I can almost believe in micro-events at the quantum level, but I cannot believe that the Renaissance (made of events within events within events) is an event, even though I may 'quantify over it', and discuss its causes and effects. |
| 15002 | If the best theory of adverbs refers to events, then our ontology should include events [Davidson, by Sider] |
| Full Idea: Davidson argued that the best linguistic theory of adverbial modification assigns truth-conditions quantifying over events; thus we must embrace an ontology of events. | |
| From: report of Donald Davidson (The Logical Form of Action Sentences [1967]) by Theodore Sider - Writing the Book of the World 07.8 | |
| A reaction: Sider is critical and I agree. This is just the sort of linguistic manoeuvre that gets philosophy a bad name. As Yablo remarks, we have a terrible tendency to want to thingify everything. |
| 9382 | Subjects may be unaware of their epistemic 'entitlements', unlike their 'justifications' [Burge] |
| Full Idea: I call 'entitlement' (as opposed to justification) the epistemic rights or warrants that need not be understood by or even be accessible to the subject. | |
| From: Tyler Burge (Content Preservation [1993]), quoted by Paul Boghossian - Analyticity Reconsidered §III | |
| A reaction: I espouse a coherentism that has both internal and external components, and is mediated socially. In Burge's sense, animals will sometimes have 'entitlement'. I prefer, though, not to call this 'knowledge'. 'Entitled true belief' is good. |
| 18239 | What is contemplated must have a higher value than contemplation [Kant, by Korsgaard] |
| Full Idea: Kant objects that the world must have a final purpose in order to be worth contemplating, so contemplation cannot be that final purpose. | |
| From: report of Immanuel Kant (Critique of Judgement II: Teleological [1790]) by Christine M. Korsgaard - Aristotle and Kant on the Source of Value 8 'Arist and' | |
| A reaction: That is a very good objection. If we contemplate the ordered heavens, the ordering of the heavens seems to have a greater value than our contemplation of them. The reply is that the contemplation is the final purpose being contemplated! |
| 18238 | Only a good will can give man's being, and hence the world, a final purpose [Kant] |
| Full Idea: A good will is that whereby alone [man's] being can have an absolute worth and in reference to which the being of the world can have a final purpose. | |
| From: Immanuel Kant (Critique of Judgement II: Teleological [1790], C3 443), quoted by Christine M. Korsgaard - Aristotle and Kant on the Source of Value 8 'Kant' | |
| A reaction: I wish Kant gave a better account of what a 'good' will consists of. This is an awful burden to bear when you are making decisions. |
| 22053 | The Critique of Judgement aims for a principle that unities humanity and nature [Kant, by Bowie] |
| Full Idea: The Critique of Judgement aims to show how judgement functions 'according to the principle of the appropriateness of nature to our capacity for cognition'. It is meant to provide a principle of the unity of humankind and nature. | |
| From: report of Immanuel Kant (Critique of Judgement II: Teleological [1790]) by Andrew Bowie - German Philosophy: a very short introduction 1 | |
| A reaction: Hence this work is often overlooked as a key part of Kant's 'system'. At first he probably didn't realise he was creating a system. Kant set an agenda for the philosophy of the ensuing thirty years. |
| 18237 | Without men creation would be in vain, and without final purpose [Kant] |
| Full Idea: Without men the whole creation would be mere waste, in vain, and without final purpose. | |
| From: Immanuel Kant (Critique of Judgement II: Teleological [1790], C3 442), quoted by Christine M. Korsgaard - Aristotle and Kant on the Source of Value 8 'Kant' | |
| A reaction: The standard early twenty-first century response to that is 'get over it'! The remark shows how deep religion runs in Kant, despite his great caution about the existence of God. His notion of 'duty' is similarly religious. |