50 ideas
| 23269 | Philosophy must start from clearly observed facts [Galen] |
| 19917 | Without reason and human help, human life is misery [Spinoza] |
| 23266 | The spirit in the soul wants freedom, power and honour [Galen] |
| 23219 | Stopping the heart doesn't terminate activity; pressing the brain does that [Galen, by Cobb] |
| 23264 | Philosophers think faculties are in substances, and invent a faculty for every activity [Galen] |
| 19922 | People are only free if they are guided entirely by reason [Spinoza] |
| 23220 | The brain contains memory and reason, and is the source of sensation and decision [Galen] |
| 23265 | The rational part of the soul is the desire for truth, understanding and recollection [Galen] |
| 2705 | How can intuitionists distinguish universal convictions from local cultural ones? [Hare] |
| 2712 | You can't use intuitions to decide which intuitions you should cultivate [Hare] |
| 2706 | Emotivists mistakenly think all disagreements are about facts, and so there are no moral reasons [Hare] |
| 2708 | An 'ought' statement implies universal application [Hare] |
| 2704 | If morality is just a natural or intuitive description, that leads to relativism [Hare] |
| 2703 | Descriptivism say ethical meaning is just truth-conditions; prescriptivism adds an evaluation [Hare] |
| 2707 | If there can be contradictory prescriptions, then reasoning must be involved [Hare] |
| 2709 | Prescriptivism sees 'ought' statements as imperatives which are universalisable [Hare] |
| 2711 | Prescriptivism implies a commitment, but descriptivism doesn't [Hare] |
| 2710 | Moral judgements must invoke some sort of principle [Hare] |
| 19935 | Peoples are created by individuals, not by nature, and only distinguished by language and law [Spinoza] |
| 19914 | In nature everything has an absolute right to do anything it is capable of doing [Spinoza] |
| 19915 | Natural rights are determined by desire and power, not by reason [Spinoza] |
| 7487 | Society exists to extend human awareness [Spinoza, by Watson] |
| 19943 | The state aims to allow personal development, so its main purpose is freedom [Spinoza] |
| 19930 | Sovereignty must include the power to make people submit to it [Spinoza] |
| 19936 | Kings tend to fight wars for glory, rather than for peace and liberty [Spinoza] |
| 19940 | Deposing a monarch is dangerous, because the people are used to royal authority [Spinoza] |
| 19937 | Monarchs are always proud, and can't back down [Spinoza] |
| 19931 | Every state is more frightened of its own citizens than of external enemies [Spinoza] |
| 19920 | Democracy is a legitimate gathering of people who do whatever they can do [Spinoza] |
| 19938 | Allowing religious ministers any control of the state is bad for both parties [Spinoza] |
| 19933 | If religion is law, then piety is justice, impiety is crime, and non-believers must leave [Spinoza] |
| 19923 | Slavery is not just obedience, but acting only in the interests of the master [Spinoza] |
| 19939 | Government is oppressive if opinions can be crimes, because people can't give them up [Spinoza] |
| 19944 | Without liberty of thought there is no trust in the state, and corruption follows [Spinoza] |
| 19942 | Treason may be committed as much by words as by deeds [Spinoza] |
| 19924 | The freest state is a rational one, where people can submit themselves to reason [Spinoza] |
| 7827 | Spinoza wanted democracy based on individual rights, and is thus the first modern political philosopher [Stewart,M on Spinoza] |
| 19926 | The sovereignty has absolute power over citizens [Spinoza] |
| 19918 | Forming a society meant following reason, and giving up dangerous appetites and mutual harm [Spinoza] |
| 19919 | People only give up their rights, and keep promises, if they hope for some greater good [Spinoza] |
| 19921 | Once you have given up your rights, there is no going back [Spinoza] |
| 19925 | In democracy we don't abandon our rights, but transfer them to the majority of us [Spinoza] |
| 19928 | No one, in giving up their power and right, ceases to be a human being [Spinoza] |
| 19929 | Everyone who gives up their rights must fear the recipients of them [Spinoza] |
| 19932 | The early Hebrews, following Moses, gave up their rights to God alone [Spinoza] |
| 19916 | The order of nature does not prohibit anything, and allows whatever appetite produces [Spinoza] |
| 23268 | We execute irredeemable people, to protect ourselves, as a deterrent, and ending a bad life [Galen] |
| 19927 | State and religious law can clash, so the state must make decisions about religion [Spinoza] |
| 19934 | Hebrews were very hostile to other states, who had not given up their rights to God [Spinoza] |
| 4300 | The Bible has nothing in common with reasoning and philosophy [Spinoza] |