16 ideas
| 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. |
| 335 | Do the gods also hold different opinions about what is right and honourable? [Plato] |
| Full Idea: Do the gods too hold different opinions about what is right, and similarly about what is honourable and dishonourable, good and bad? | |
| From: Plato (Euthyphro [c.398 BCE], 07e) |
| 4020 | The modern self has disengaged reason, self-exploration, and personal commitment [Taylor,C] |
| Full Idea: The modern notion of the self is defined by disengaged reason (with its associated freedom and dignity), by self-exploration, and by personal commitment. | |
| From: Charles Taylor (Sources of the Self [1989], §13.1) | |
| A reaction: Taylor makes a good case that this broader view of how the self is seen is as important as narrow debates about personal identity. |
| 4002 | My aim is to map the connections between our sense of self and our moral understanding [Taylor,C] |
| Full Idea: My entire way of proceeding involves mapping connections between the sense of the self and moral visions, between identity and the good. | |
| From: Charles Taylor (Sources of the Self [1989], Pref) | |
| A reaction: An interesting project. Modern brain research supports the idea that emotions and values are tightly integrated into al thought. |
| 4006 | I can only be aware of myself as a person who changes by means of my personal history [Taylor,C] |
| Full Idea: As a being who grows and becomes I can only know myself through the history of my maturations and regressions, overcomings and defeats. | |
| From: Charles Taylor (Sources of the Self [1989], §2.3) | |
| A reaction: An important insight. My immediate sense of self makes my personal history central, not an extra. But a history must be a history OF something. |
| 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). |
| 4003 | Selfhood and moral values are inextricably intertwined [Taylor,C] |
| Full Idea: Selfhood and the good, or in another way selfhood and morality, turn out to be inextricably intertwined. | |
| From: Charles Taylor (Sources of the Self [1989], §1.1) | |
| A reaction: This seems an inevitable convergence of three centuries of thought about personal identity and morality. |
| 4021 | Willingness to risk life was the constitutive quality of the man of honour [Taylor,C] |
| Full Idea: Willingness to risk life was the constitutive quality of the man of honour. | |
| From: Charles Taylor (Sources of the Self [1989], §13.1) | |
| A reaction: Which is why war is required. The growth of civil society meant the inevitable rise of other virtues. |
| 4005 | To have respect for people, you must feel their claims, or their injustices, or hold them in awe [Taylor,C] |
| Full Idea: If you want to discriminate more finely what makes humans worthy of respect, you must call to mind the claim of human suffering, or what is repugnant about justice, or the awe you feel about human life. | |
| From: Charles Taylor (Sources of the Self [1989], §1.1) | |
| A reaction: A persuasive part of the claim that such feelings are inseparable from thinking about people in any way at all. |
| 4004 | Consistency presupposes intrinsic description [Taylor,C] |
| Full Idea: The issue of consistency presupposes intrinsic description. | |
| From: Charles Taylor (Sources of the Self [1989], §1.1) | |
| A reaction: This may be the key criticism of Kant. The so-called 'maxim' of an action can be almost infinitely re-expressed to suit the agent. |
| 4010 | In later utilitarianism the modern stress on freedom leads to the rejection of paternalism [Taylor,C] |
| Full Idea: In mature utilitarianism , the stress on modern freedom emerges in the rejection of paternalism. | |
| From: Charles Taylor (Sources of the Self [1989], §3.3) | |
| A reaction: This seems good; it is the beginnings of a rejection of paternalism. What is better, happiness or freedom? What is the value of freedom? |
| 336 | Is what is pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because they love it? (the 'Euthyphro Question') [Plato] |
| Full Idea: Is what is pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because they love it? | |
| From: Plato (Euthyphro [c.398 BCE], 10a) | |
| A reaction: The famous Euthyphro Question, the key question about the supposed religious basis of morality. The answer of Socrates is Idea 337. |
| 337 | It seems that the gods love things because they are pious, rather than making them pious by loving them [Plato] |
| Full Idea: So things are loved by the gods because they are pious, and not pious because they are loved? It seems so. | |
| From: Plato (Euthyphro [c.398 BCE], 10e) | |
| A reaction: Socrates' answer to the Euthyphro Question (see Idea 336). The form of piety precedes the gods. |
| 4009 | Nominalists defended the sovereignty of God against the idea of natural existing good and evil [Taylor,C] |
| Full Idea: Late medieval nominalism defended the sovereignty of God as incompatible with there being an order in nature which by itself defined good and bad. | |
| From: Charles Taylor (Sources of the Self [1989], §3.3) | |
| A reaction: Part of their attack on Platonism. But what made them place such a high value on the sovereignty of God? |