48 ideas
23853 | Truth is not a object we love - it is the radiant manifestation of reality [Weil] |
23855 | Creation produced a network or web of determinations [Weil] |
22355 | In the realist view, the real external world explains how it (and perceptions of it) are possible [Williams,B] |
4244 | It is very confused to deduce a nonrelativist morality of universal toleration from relativism [Williams,B] |
4243 | Our ability to react to an alien culture shows that ethical thought extends beyond cultural boundaries [Williams,B] |
23848 | The aesthete's treatment of beauty as amusement is sacreligious; beauty should nourish [Weil] |
4114 | Philosophers try to produce ethical theories because they falsely assume that ethics can be simple [Williams,B] |
23854 | Beauty is the proof of what is good [Weil] |
4128 | Intuitionism has been demolished by critics, and no longer looks interesting [Williams,B] |
4132 | The category of person is a weak basis for ethics, because it is not fixed but comes in degrees [Williams,B] |
4134 | The weakness of prescriptivism is shown by "I simply don't like staying at good hotels" [Williams,B] |
4135 | Some ethical ideas, such as 'treachery' and 'promise', seem to express a union of facts and values [Williams,B] |
4120 | It is an error of consequentialism to think we just aim at certain states of affairs; we also want to act [Williams,B] |
4252 | Promise keeping increases reliability, by making deliberation focus on something which would be overlooked [Williams,B] |
4116 | A weakness of contractual theories is the position of a person of superior ability and power [Williams,B] |
4112 | A crucial feature of moral thought is second-order desire - the desire to have certain desires [Williams,B] |
23837 | Respect is our only obligation, which can only be expressed through deeds, not words [Weil] |
4113 | 'Deon' in Greek means what one must do; there was no word meaning 'duty' [Williams,B] |
4250 | The concept of a 'duty to myself' is fraudulent [Williams,B] |
4110 | Obligation and duty look backwards (because of a promise or job), although the acts are in the future [Williams,B] |
4249 | "Ought implies can" is a famous formula in connection with moral obligation [Williams,B] |
4248 | Not all moral deliberations lead to obligations; some merely reveal what 'may' be done [Williams,B] |
4121 | Why should I think of myself as both the legislator and the citizen who follows the laws? [Williams,B] |
4122 | If the self becomes completely impartial, it no longer has enough identity to worry about its interests [Williams,B] |
4124 | Utilitarian benevolence involves no particular attachments, and is immune to the inverse square law [Williams,B] |
4245 | Ethical conviction must be to some extent passive, and can't just depend on the will and decisions [Williams,B] |
4246 | Taking responsibility won't cure ethical uncertainty by; we are uncertain what to decide [Williams,B] |
23844 | The most important human need is to have multiple roots [Weil] |
23838 | The need for order stands above all others, and is understood via the other needs [Weil] |
23836 | Obligations only bind individuals, not collectives [Weil] |
23843 | Even the poorest should feel collective ownership, and participation in grand display [Weil] |
23840 | A citizen should be able to understand the whole of society [Weil] |
23846 | Culture is an instrument for creating an ongoing succession of teachers [Weil] |
23839 | A lifelong head of society should only be a symbol, not a ruler [Weil] |
23842 | Party politics in a democracy can't avoid an anti-democratic party [Weil] |
23847 | Socialism tends to make a proletariat of the whole population [Weil] |
23845 | The capitalists neglect the people and the nation, and even their own interests [Weil] |
23841 | By making money the sole human measure, inequality has become universal [Weil] |
23835 | People have duties, and only have rights because of the obligations of others to them [Weil] |
23852 | To punish people we must ourselves be innocent - but that undermines the desire to punish [Weil] |
23850 | The soldier-civilian distinction should be abolished; every citizen is committed to a war [Weil] |
4247 | It is a mark of our having ethical values that we aim to reproduce them in our children [Williams,B] |
23851 | Education is essentially motivation [Weil] |
4131 | Most women see an early miscarriage and a late stillbirth as being very different in character [Williams,B] |
4133 | Speciesism isn't like racism, because the former implies a viewpoint which belongs to no one [Williams,B] |
1748 | Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless [Archelaus, by Diog. Laertius] |
5989 | Archelaus said life began in a primeval slime [Archelaus, by Schofield] |
23849 | Religion should quietly suffuse all human life with its light [Weil] |