Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'The Roots of Reference', 'Two Concepts of Liberty' and 'The Language of Morals'

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4 ideas

7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 5. Supervenience / c. Significance of supervenience

16050	The goodness of a picture supervenes on the picture; duplicates must be equally good [Hare]
	Full Idea: Characteristic of value-words is that they name 'supervenient' properties. If we are discussing whether a picture is a good picture, ..and there is another picture that is a replica of it, we cannot say 'they are alike, but one is good and the other not'.
	From: Richard M. Hare (The Language of Morals [1952], 5.2)
	A reaction: [compressed] Horgan says this is the passage which introduced 'supervenience' into contemporary discussions. I think the best simple word for it is that the goodness of the picture 'tracks' its physical characteristics. It also depend on them.

8. Modes of Existence / C. Powers and Dispositions / 3. Powers as Derived

14296	Dispositions are physical states of mechanism; when known, these replace the old disposition term [Quine]
	Full Idea: Each disposition, in my view, is a physical state or mechanism. ...In some cases nowadays we understand the physical details and set them forth explicitly in terms of the arrangement and interaction of small bodies. This replaces the old disposition.
	From: Willard Quine (The Roots of Reference [1990], p.11), quoted by Stephen Mumford - Dispositions 01.3
	A reaction: A challenge to the dispositions and powers view of nature, one which rests on the 'categorical' structural properties, rather than the 'hypothetical' dispositions. But can we define a mechanism without mentioning its powers?

22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / i. Prescriptivism

2855	In primary evaluative words like 'ought' prescription is constant but description can vary [Hare, by Hooker,B]
	Full Idea: Hare says words are secondarily evaluative (e.g. 'soft-hearted') if prescriptive meaning varies but description is constant; primarily evaluative words ('good', 'right', 'ought') are the opposite, with the descriptive content varying.
	From: report of Richard M. Hare (The Language of Morals [1952]) by Brad W. Hooker - Prescriptivism p.640
	A reaction: I would have thought that the prescriptive meaning of the evaluative word could at least vary in strength. You really, really ought to do that.

25. Social Practice / A. Freedoms / 5. Freedom of lifestyle

20544	Berlin distinguishes 'negative' and 'positive' liberty, and rejects the latter [Berlin, by Swift]
	Full Idea: Isaiah Berlin draws a famous distinction between 'negative' and 'positive' concepts of liberty, and argues that the latter should be seen as a wrong turning (because totalitarian regimes have invoked it).
	From: report of Isaiah Berlin (Two Concepts of Liberty [1958]) by Adam Swift - Political Philosophy (3rd ed) 2 'Intro'
	A reaction: Swift argues against him, saying that positive liberty is not a single concept (it's three), and has aspects that should be defended. I think I'm with Swift on that. Is religious freedom a freedom 'from' something, or a freedom 'to do' something?