14 ideas
13407 | All worthwhile philosophy is synthetic theorizing, evaluated by experience [Papineau] |
Full Idea: I would say that all worthwhile philosophy consists of synthetic theorizing, evaluated against experience. | |
From: David Papineau (Philosophical Insignificance of A Priori Knowledge [2010], §1) | |
A reaction: This is the view that philosophy is just science at a high level of abstraction, and he explicitly rejects 'conceptual analysis' as a fruitful activity. I need to take a stance on this one, but find I am in a state of paralysis. Welcome to philosophy... |
11211 | If a sound conclusion comes from two errors that cancel out, the path of the argument must matter [Rumfitt] |
Full Idea: If a designated conclusion follows from the premisses, but the argument involves two howlers which cancel each other out, then the moral is that the path an argument takes from premisses to conclusion does matter to its logical evaluation. | |
From: Ian Rumfitt ("Yes" and "No" [2000], II) | |
A reaction: The drift of this is that our view of logic should be a little closer to the reasoning of ordinary language, and we should rely a little less on purely formal accounts. |
11210 | Standardly 'and' and 'but' are held to have the same sense by having the same truth table [Rumfitt] |
Full Idea: If 'and' and 'but' really are alike in sense, in what might that likeness consist? Some philosophers of classical logic will reply that they share a sense by virtue of sharing a truth table. | |
From: Ian Rumfitt ("Yes" and "No" [2000]) | |
A reaction: This is the standard view which Rumfitt sets out to challenge. |
11212 | The sense of a connective comes from primitively obvious rules of inference [Rumfitt] |
Full Idea: A connective will possess the sense that it has by virtue of its competent users' finding certain rules of inference involving it to be primitively obvious. | |
From: Ian Rumfitt ("Yes" and "No" [2000], III) | |
A reaction: Rumfitt cites Peacocke as endorsing this view, which characterises the logical connectives by their rules of usage rather than by their pure semantic value. |
13409 | Our best theories may commit us to mathematical abstracta, but that doesn't justify the commitment [Papineau] |
Full Idea: Our empirically best-supported theories may commit us to certain abstract mathematical entities, but this does not necessarily mean that this is what justifies our commitment. That we are committed doesn't explain why we should be. | |
From: David Papineau (Philosophical Insignificance of A Priori Knowledge [2010], §4) | |
A reaction: A nice point. It is only a slightly gormless scientism which would say that we have to accept whatever scientists demand. Who's in charge here - scientists, mathematicians or philosophers? Don't answer that... |
13406 | A priori knowledge is analytic - the structure of our concepts - and hence unimportant [Papineau] |
Full Idea: I am a fully paid up-naturalist, but I see no reason to deny that a priori knowledge is possible. My view is that a priori knowledge is unimportant (esp to philosophy). If there is a priori knowledge, it is analytic, true by the structure of our concepts. | |
From: David Papineau (Philosophical Insignificance of A Priori Knowledge [2010], §1) | |
A reaction: It is one thing to say it is the structure of our concepts, and another to infer that it is unimportant. I take the structure of our concepts to be a shadow cast by the structure of the world. E.g. the structure of numbers reveals the world. |
13408 | Intuition and thought-experiments embody substantial information about the world [Papineau] |
Full Idea: Naturalists can allow for thought-experiments in philosophy. Intuitions play an important role, but only because they embody substantial information about the world. | |
From: David Papineau (Philosophical Insignificance of A Priori Knowledge [2010], §3) | |
A reaction: In this sense, intuitions are just memories which are too complex for us to articulate. They are not the intuitions of 'pure reason'. It is hard to connect the intuitive spotting of a proof with memories of the physical world. |
13410 | Verificationism about concepts means you can't deny a theory, because you can't have the concept [Papineau] |
Full Idea: Verificationism about concepts implies that thinkers will not share concepts with adherents of theories they reject. Those who reject the phlogiston theory will not possess the same concept as adherents, so cannot say 'there is no phlogiston'. | |
From: David Papineau (Philosophical Insignificance of A Priori Knowledge [2010], §6) | |
A reaction: The point seems to be more general - that it is hard to see how you can have a concept of anything which doesn't actually exist, if the concept is meant to rest on some sort of empirical verification. |
11214 | We learn 'not' along with affirmation, by learning to either affirm or deny a sentence [Rumfitt] |
Full Idea: The standard view is that affirming not-A is more complex than affirming the atomic sentence A itself, with the latter determining its sense. But we could learn 'not' directly, by learning at once how to either affirm A or reject A. | |
From: Ian Rumfitt ("Yes" and "No" [2000], IV) | |
A reaction: [compressed] This seems fairly anti-Fregean in spirit, because it looks at the psychology of how we learn 'not' as a way of clarifying what we mean by it, rather than just looking at its logical behaviour (and thus giving it a secondary role). |
22709 | We should first decide what are the great works of art, with aesthetic theory following from that [Murdoch] |
Full Idea: Our aesthetic must stand to be judged by great works of art which we know to be such independently. …So let us start by saying that Shakespeare is the greatest of all artists, and let our aesthetic be the philosophical justification of this judgement. | |
From: Iris Murdoch (The Sublime and the Good [1959], p.205) | |
A reaction: She offers this view in specific contradiction of Tolstoy, which says we should first have a theory, and then judge accordingly. I take Murdoch to be entirely right, but it means that our aesthetic theory will shift over time. |
22715 | Great art proves the absurdity of art for art's sake [Murdoch] |
Full Idea: The work of the great artists shows up 'art-for-art's-sake' as a flimsy frivolous doctrine. | |
From: Iris Murdoch (The Sublime and the Good [1959], p.218) | |
A reaction: She keeps referring to tragedy (as the greatest art), but it is hard to see how we learn love and morality from a great pot or a great abstract painting. Wilde makes the doctrine frivolous, but I think it contains a degree of truth. Music. |
22714 | Because art is love, it improves us morally [Murdoch] |
Full Idea: It is of course a fact that if art is love then art improves us morally, but this is, as it were, accidental. | |
From: Iris Murdoch (The Sublime and the Good [1959], p.218) | |
A reaction: Is an enhancement of one's love necessarily a moral improvement? Love is a fine feeling, but how does it motivate? Has no wickedness ever been perpetrated in the name of love? 'All's fair in love and war'. |
22712 | Art and morals are essentially the same, and are both identical with love [Murdoch] |
Full Idea: Art and morals are (with certain provisos) one. Their essence is the same. The essence of both of them is love. Love is the perception of individuals. | |
From: Iris Murdoch (The Sublime and the Good [1959], p.215) | |
A reaction: The idea that art, morals and love are all just a single thing seems unhelpful. What about satire? What about duty without love? What about pure abstract painting? What about Stravinsky's highly formal view of his music? |
22713 | Love is realising something other than oneself is real [Murdoch] |
Full Idea: Love is the extremely difficult realisation that something other than oneself is real. | |
From: Iris Murdoch (The Sublime and the Good [1959], p.215) | |
A reaction: I suspect that this is a necessary condition for love, but not the thing itself. The realisation she describes may not be love. You would attain her realisation if you shared a prison cell with a terrifying psychopath. |