49 ideas
3600 | Slow and accurate thought makes the greatest progress [Descartes] |
3601 | Most things in human life seem vain and useless [Descartes] |
3602 | Almost every daft idea has been expressed by some philosopher [Descartes] |
3603 | Methodical thinking is cautious, analytical, systematic, and panoramic [Descartes, by PG] |
21021 | Keep premises as weak as possible, to avoid controversial difficulties [Nussbaum] |
3612 | Clear and distinct conceptions are true because a perfect God exists [Descartes] |
3610 | Truth is clear and distinct conception - of which it is hard to be sure [Descartes] |
8915 | How we refer to abstractions is much less clear than how we refer to other things [Rosen] |
3605 | We can believe a thing without knowing we believe it [Descartes] |
1583 | In morals Descartes accepts the conventional, but rejects it in epistemology [Roochnik on Descartes] |
3607 | In thinking everything else false, my own existence remains totally certain [Descartes] |
3617 | I aim to find the principles and causes of everything, using the seeds within my mind [Descartes] |
3611 | Understanding, rather than imagination or senses, gives knowledge [Descartes] |
3606 | I was searching for reliable rock under the shifting sand [Descartes] |
3604 | When rebuilding a house, one needs alternative lodgings [Descartes] |
3618 | Only experiments can settle disagreements between rival explanations [Descartes] |
3615 | Little reason is needed to speak, so animals have no reason at all [Descartes] |
3609 | I am a thinking substance, which doesn't need a place or material support [Descartes] |
3608 | I can deny my body and the world, but not my own existence [Descartes] |
3613 | Reason is universal in its responses, but a physical machine is constrained by its organs [Descartes] |
3616 | The soul must unite with the body to have appetites and sensations [Descartes] |
3614 | A machine could speak in response to physical stimulus, but not hold a conversation [Descartes] |
8917 | The Way of Abstraction used to say an abstraction is an idea that was formed by abstracting [Rosen] |
8912 | Nowadays abstractions are defined as non-spatial, causally inert things [Rosen] |
8913 | Chess may be abstract, but it has existed in specific space and time [Rosen] |
8914 | Sets are said to be abstract and non-spatial, but a set of books can be on a shelf [Rosen] |
8916 | Conflating abstractions with either sets or universals is a big claim, needing a big defence [Rosen] |
8918 | Functional terms can pick out abstractions by asserting an equivalence relation [Rosen] |
8919 | Abstraction by equivalence relationships might prove that a train is an abstract entity [Rosen] |
21007 | Storytelling is never neutral; some features of the world must be emphasised [Nussbaum] |
21025 | Particularism gives no guidance for the future [Nussbaum] |
1581 | Greeks elevate virtues enormously, but never explain them [Descartes] |
21026 | Compassion is unreliable, because it favours people close to us [Nussbaum] |
21019 | Social contracts assume equal powers among the participants [Nussbaum] |
21011 | We shouldn't focus on actual preferences, which may be distorted by injustices [Nussbaum] |
21008 | Liberalism does not need a comprehensive account of value [Nussbaum] |
21012 | Women are often treated like children, and not respected for their choices [Nussbaum] |
21015 | Negative liberty is incoherent; all liberties, to do and to be, require the prevention of interference [Nussbaum] |
21017 | Political freedom is an incoherent project, because some freedoms limit other freedoms [Nussbaum] |
21016 | Political and civil rights are not separate from economic and social rights [Nussbaum] |
21009 | Capabilities: Life, Health, Safety, Mental life, Love, Planning, Joining in, Nature, Play, Control [Nussbaum, by PG] |
21010 | Justice requires that the ten main capabilities of people are reasonably enabled [Nussbaum] |
21013 | Capabilities are grounded in bare humanity and agency; qualifying as rational is not needed [Nussbaum] |
21014 | Rights are not just barriers against state interference; governments must affirm capabilities of citizens [Nussbaum] |
21020 | Any establishment belief system is incompatible with full respect for all citizens [Nussbaum] |
21023 | We should respect animals in the way that we respect the animal nature in humans [Nussbaum] |
21024 | It may be no harm to kill an animal which cannot plan for its future [Nussbaum] |
21022 | The Capabilities Approach sees animals as agents, not just as having feelings [Nussbaum] |
16686 | God has established laws throughout nature, and implanted ideas of them within us [Descartes] |