118 ideas
| 19073 | True philosophy aims at absolute unity, while our understanding sees only separation [Hegel] |
| 15624 | Free thinking has no presuppositions [Hegel] |
| 15631 | The ideal of reason is the unification of abstract identity (or 'concept') and being [Hegel] |
| 15612 | Older metaphysics naively assumed that thought grasped things in themselves [Hegel] |
| 3722 | Metaphysics goes beyond the empirical, so doesn't need examples [Kant] |
| 21768 | Logic is metaphysics, the science of things grasped in thoughts [Hegel] |
| 21984 | We must break up the rigidity that our understanding has imposed [Hegel] |
| 22081 | Let thought follow its own course, and don't interfere [Hegel] |
| 3738 | The hallmark of rationality is setting itself an end [Kant] |
| 15626 | Categories create objective experience, but are too conditioned by things to actually grasp them [Hegel] |
| 15616 | If truth is just non-contradiction, we must take care that our basic concepts aren't contradictory [Hegel] |
| 15638 | Dialectic is the moving soul of scientific progression, the principle which binds science together [Hegel] |
| 21767 | Dialectic is seen in popular proverbs like 'pride comes before a fall' [Hegel] |
| 15639 | Socratic dialectic is subjective, but Plato made it freely scientific and objective [Hegel] |
| 15615 | Older metaphysics became dogmatic, by assuming opposed assertions must be true and false [Hegel] |
| 19070 | Superficial truth is knowing how something is, which is consciousness of bare correctness [Hegel] |
| 5644 | In Hegel's logic it is concepts (rather than judgements or propositions) which are true or false [Hegel, by Scruton] |
| 19072 | In the deeper sense of truth, to be untrue resembles being bad; badness is untrue to a thing's nature [Hegel] |
| 19071 | The deeper sense of truth is a thing matching the idea of what it ought to be [Hegel] |
| 21595 | Excluded middle is the maxim of definite understanding, but just produces contradictions [Hegel] |
| 15628 | The idea that contradiction is essential to rational understanding is a key modern idea [Hegel] |
| 15629 | Tenderness for the world solves the antinomies; contradiction is in our reason, not in the essence of the world [Hegel] |
| 15630 | Antinomies are not just in four objects, but in all objects, all representations, all objects and all ideas [Hegel] |
| 22078 | Even simple propositions about sensations are filled with categories [Hegel] |
| 15634 | Thought about particulars is done entirely through categories [Hegel] |
| 21981 | The one substance is formless without the mediation of dialectical concepts [Hegel] |
| 15637 | Essence is the essential self-positing unity of immediacy and mediation [Hegel] |
| 15613 | Real cognition grasps a thing from within itself, and is not satisfied with mere predicates [Hegel] |
| 15636 | The Cogito is at the very centre of the entire concern of modern philosophy [Hegel] |
| 22300 | Existence is just a set of relationships [Hegel] |
| 3726 | The categorical imperative is a practical synthetic a priori proposition [Kant] |
| 15609 | The sensible is distinguished from thought by being about singular things [Hegel] |
| 15625 | Sense perception is secondary and dependent, while thought is independent and primitive [Hegel] |
| 15619 | Empiricism made particular knowledge possible, and blocked wild claims [Hegel] |
| 15620 | Empiricism contains the important idea that we should see knowledge for ourselves, and be part of it [Hegel] |
| 15622 | Empiricism unknowingly contains and uses a metaphysic, which underlies its categories [Hegel] |
| 15621 | Empiricism of the finite denies the supersensible, and can only think with formal abstraction [Hegel] |
| 15632 | The Humean view stops us thinking about perception, and finding universals and necessities in it [Hegel] |
| 15623 | Humean scepticism, unlike ancient Greek scepticism, accepts the truth of experience as basic [Hegel] |
| 3739 | Free will is a kind of causality which works independently of other causes [Kant] |
| 3741 | We shall never be able to comprehend how freedom is possible [Kant] |
| 3740 | We cannot conceive of reason as being externally controlled [Kant] |
| 5296 | Kant made the political will into a pure self-determined "free" will [Kant, by Marx/Engels] |
| 15617 | In abstraction, beyond finitude, freedom and necessity must exist together [Hegel] |
| 15608 | The act of thinking is the bringing forth of universals [Hegel] |
| 24011 | Kant thought emotions are too random and passive to be part of morality [Kant, by Williams,B] |
| 21986 | Hegel's system has a vast number of basic concepts [Hegel, by Moore,AW] |
| 8090 | Since the language of thought is the same for all, it must be something like logical form [Fodor, by Devlin] |
| 15607 | We don't think with concepts - we think the concepts [Hegel] |
| 15610 | Active thought about objects produces the universal, which is what is true and essential of it [Hegel] |
| 11143 | If concept-learning is hypothesis-testing, that needs innate concepts to get started [Fodor, by Margolis/Laurence] |
| 5074 | Kant united religion and philosophy, by basing obedience to law on reason instead of faith [Taylor,R on Kant] |
| 8024 | The categorical imperative says nothing about what our activities and ends should be [MacIntyre on Kant] |
| 22390 | Kant thought human nature was pure hedonism, so virtue is only possible via the categorical imperative [Foot on Kant] |
| 9750 | We must only value what others find acceptable [Kant, by Korsgaard] |
| 20160 | Kant focuses exclusively on human values, and neglects cultural and personal values [Kekes on Kant] |
| 9749 | Our rational choices confer value, arising from the sense that we ourselves are important [Kant, by Korsgaard] |
| 7671 | Values are created by human choices, and are not some intrinsic quality, out there [Kant, by Berlin] |
| 3720 | We may claim noble motives, but we cannot penetrate our secret impulses [Kant] |
| 3717 | Reverence is awareness of a value which demolishes my self-love [Kant] |
| 3712 | A good will is not good because of what it achieves [Kant] |
| 3725 | The good of an action is in the mind of the doer, not the consequences [Kant] |
| 3733 | The 'golden rule' cannot be a universal law as it implies no duties [Kant] |
| 3736 | Virtue lets a rational being make universal law, and share in the kingdom of ends [Kant] |
| 3544 | Kant thinks virtue becomes passive, and hence morally unaccountable [Kant, by Annas] |
| 7674 | Generosity and pity are vices, because they falsely imply one person's superiority to another [Kant, by Berlin] |
| 21029 | Kantian respect is for humanity and reason (not from love or sympathy or solidarity) [Kant, by Sandel] |
| 3715 | Other causes can produce nice results, so morality must consist in the law, found only in rational beings [Kant] |
| 4024 | Kant follows Rousseau in defining freedom and morality in terms of each other [Taylor,C on Kant] |
| 7105 | If 'maxims' are deeper underlying intentions, Kant can be read as a virtue theorist [Kant, by Statman] |
| 3710 | The only purely good thing is a good will [Kant] |
| 7625 | We can ask how rational goodness is, but also why is rationality good [Putnam on Kant] |
| 3737 | The will is good if its universalised maxim is never in conflict with itself [Kant] |
| 20715 | It is basic that moral actions must be done from duty [Kant] |
| 3723 | There are no imperatives for a holy will, as the will is in harmony with moral law [Kant] |
| 5295 | Kant was happy with 'good will', even if it had no result [Kant, by Marx/Engels] |
| 3714 | Dutiful actions are judged not by purpose, but by the maxim followed [Kant] |
| 3718 | Telling the truth from duty is quite different from doing so to avoid inconvenience [Kant] |
| 6695 | Kant has to attribute high moral worth to some deeply unattractive human lives [Kant, by Graham] |
| 8028 | Kantian duty seems to imply conformism with authority [MacIntyre on Kant] |
| 3724 | A categorical imperative sees an action as necessary purely for its own sake [Kant] |
| 3735 | Men are subject to laws which are both self-made and universal [Kant] |
| 8026 | Almost any precept can be consistently universalized [MacIntyre on Kant] |
| 15673 | The intuition behind the categorical imperative is that one ought not to make an exception of oneself [Kant, by Finlayson] |
| 8068 | Universalising a maxim needs to first stipulate the right description for the action [Anscombe on Kant] |
| 22009 | Morality is the creation of the laws that enable a Kingdom of Ends [Kant] |
| 3727 | Act as if your maxim were to become a universal law of nature [Kant] |
| 4413 | The categorical imperative smells of cruelty [Nietzsche on Kant] |
| 3719 | If lying were the universal law it would make promises impossible [Kant] |
| 3716 | Act according to a maxim you can will as a universal law [Kant] |
| 8025 | The categorical imperative will not suggest maxims suitable for testing [MacIntyre on Kant] |
| 8027 | I can universalize a selfish maxim, if it is expressed in a way that only applies to me [MacIntyre on Kant] |
| 3728 | Suicide, false promises, neglected talent, and lack of charity all involve contradictions of principle [Kant, by PG] |
| 22008 | Always treat yourself and others as an end, and never simply as a means [Kant] |
| 3762 | Why couldn't all rational beings accept outrageously immoral rules of conduct? [Mill on Kant] |
| 22050 | The maxim of an action is chosen, and not externally imposed [Kant, by Bowie] |
| 3731 | Rational beings necessarily conceive their own existence as an end in itself [Kant] |
| 6694 | Always treat humanity as an end and never as a means only [Kant] |
| 4345 | For Kant, even a person who lacks all sympathy for others still has a motive for benevolence [Kant, by Hursthouse] |
| 3711 | Only a good will makes us worthy of happiness [Kant] |
| 4251 | If we are required to give moral thought the highest priority, this gives morality no content [Williams,B on Kant] |
| 16004 | If Kant lives by self-administered laws, this is as feeble as self-administered punishments [Kierkegaard on Kant] |
| 4344 | Actions where people spread happiness because they enjoy it have no genuine moral worth [Kant] |
| 3713 | The function of reason is to produce a good will [Kant] |
| 3729 | Our inclinations are not innately desirable; in fact most rational beings would like to be rid of them [Kant] |
| 3732 | Rational beings have a right to share in the end of an action, not just be part of the means [Kant] |
| 7670 | Kant is the father of the notion of exploitation as an evil [Kant, by Berlin] |
| 7591 | Kant completed Grotius's project of a non-religious basis for natural law [Scruton on Kant] |
| 7673 | Retributive punishment is better than being sent to hospital for your crimes [Kant, by Berlin] |
| 3730 | Non-rational beings only have a relative value, as means rather than as ends [Kant] |
| 15614 | Old metaphysics tried to grasp eternal truths through causal events, which is impossible [Hegel] |
| 15618 | If God is the abstract of Supremely Real Essence, then God is a mere Beyond, and unknowable [Hegel] |
| 15635 | The older conception of God was emptied of human features, to make it worthy of the Infinite [Hegel] |
| 21980 | God is the absolute thing, and also the absolute person [Hegel] |
| 3721 | We judge God to be good by a priori standards of moral perfection [Kant] |
| 8046 | We can only know we should obey God if we already have moral standards for judging God [Kant, by MacIntyre] |
| 15633 | We establish unification of the Ideal by the ontological proof, deriving being from abstraction of thinking [Hegel] |
| 20714 | God is not proved by reason, but is a postulate of moral thinking [Kant, by Davies,B] |