20 ideas
| 9254 | In philosophy the truth can only be reached via the ruins of the false [Prichard] |
| Full Idea: In philosophy the truth can only be reached via the ruins of the false. | |
| From: H.A. Prichard (What is the Basis of Moral Obligation? [1925]) | |
| A reaction: A lovely remark! In a flash you suddenly see why philosophers expend such vast energy on such unpromising views of reality (e.g. idealism, panpsychism). This might be the best definition of philosophy I have yet discovered. |
| 9261 | The 'Ethics' is disappointing, because it fails to try to justify our duties [Prichard] |
| Full Idea: Reading the 'Ethics' is so disappointing, because Aristotle does not try to convince us that we really ought to do what our non-reflective consciousness has hitherto believed we ought to do. | |
| From: H.A. Prichard (Does moral phil rest on a mistake? [1912]) | |
| A reaction: Aristotle didn't speak the language of 'duty' (see Idea 2172), but he could work it into his account if Prichard asked nicely. I take the truly virtuous person to be, above all, a wonderful citizen. Duties are contractual; good deeds flow from virtue. |
| 9262 | The mistake is to think we can prove what can only be seen directly in moral thinking [Prichard] |
| Full Idea: Moral Philosophy rests on the mistake of supposing the possibility of proving what can only be apprehended directly by an act of moral thinking. | |
| From: H.A. Prichard (Does moral phil rest on a mistake? [1912]) | |
| A reaction: This is a beginning of the rebellion against the Enlightenment Project in ethics, which is why Prichard has become popular. At bottom he is offering intuition ('direct moral thinking'), which is a frustratingly thin concept. |
| 9256 | I see the need to pay a debt in a particular instance, and any instance will do [Prichard] |
| Full Idea: How can I be brought to see the truth of the principle of paying a debt except in connection with a particular instance? For this purpose any instance will do. If I cannot see that I ought to pay this debt, I shall not see that I ought to a debt. | |
| From: H.A. Prichard (What is the Basis of Moral Obligation? [1925]) | |
| A reaction: This isn't quite particularism, which would (I think) say that the degree of obligation will never be quite the same in any two situations, and so one instance will not suffice to understand the duty. |
| 9257 | The complexities of life make it almost impossible to assess morality from a universal viewpoint [Prichard] |
| Full Idea: Owing to the complication of human relations, the problem of what one ought to do from the point of view of life as a whole is one of intense difficulty. | |
| From: H.A. Prichard (What is the Basis of Moral Obligation? [1925]) | |
| A reaction: I suspect that the difficulty is not the problems engendered by complexity, but that there is no answer available from the most objective point of view. Morality simply is a matter of how daily life is conducted, with medium-term goals only. |
| 9260 | Virtues won't generate an obligation, so it isn't a basis for morality [Prichard] |
| Full Idea: It is untrue to urge that, since courage is a virtue, we ought to act courageously. We feel an obligation to act, but not from a certain desire. The action is done from obligation, so isn't an act of courage. ..In fact, virtue is no basis for morality. | |
| From: H.A. Prichard (Does moral phil rest on a mistake? [1912]) | |
| A reaction: One of the few interesting and direct attacks on virtue theory, before its modern revival. Prichard urges a perception of what is valuable (or good) as the basis for obligation and right action. He is right that values come first, in virtue and elsewhere. |
| 9259 | We feel obligations to overcome our own failings, and these are not relations to other people [Prichard] |
| Full Idea: The relation involved in an obligation need not be a relation to another at all. Thus we should admit that there is an obligation to overcome our natural timidity or greediness, and this involves no relations to others. | |
| From: H.A. Prichard (Does moral phil rest on a mistake? [1912]) | |
| A reaction: An interesting un-Aristotelian and individualistic view of virtue. Why would we want to rid ourselves of timidity or greediness? Either it is self-interested, or we wish to be better citizens. See Richard Taylor on duty. |
| 9255 | Seeing the goodness of an effect creates the duty to produce it, not the desire [Prichard] |
| Full Idea: The appreciation of the goodness of the effect is different from desire for the effect, and will originate not the desire but the sense of obligation to produce it. | |
| From: H.A. Prichard (What is the Basis of Moral Obligation? [1925]) | |
| A reaction: A wonderful rebuttal of Hume, and a much better account of duty than Kant's idea that it arises from reason. Perception of value is what generates duty. And (with Frankfurt) we may say that love is what generates value. |
| 9258 | If pain were instrinsically wrong, it would be immoral to inflict it on ourselves [Prichard] |
| Full Idea: If the badness of pain were the reason why we ought not to inflict pain on another, it would equally be a reason why we ought not to inflict pain on ourselves; yet, though we would call such behaviour foolish, we wouldn't think it wrong. | |
| From: H.A. Prichard (Does moral phil rest on a mistake? [1912], n4) | |
| A reaction: A very nice point. Note that it will equally well apply to 'benefit' or 'preferences', or any other ideal which utilitarians set out to maximise. It may not be bad to hurt yourself, but it might still be bad to harm yourself. |
| 20086 | Nowadays sovereignty (once the basis of a state) has become relative [Reybrouck] |
| Full Idea: In the twenty-first century, sovereignty, once the basis of the nation state, has become a relative concept. ...Powerlessness is the key word of our time. | |
| From: David van Reybrouck (Against Elections [2013], 1 'Crisis') | |
| A reaction: The point is that nation states now have limited power, in the face of larger unions, multinational companies, and global problems. |
| 20090 | Today it seems almost impossible to learn the will of the people [Reybrouck] |
| Full Idea: Imagine having to develop a system today that would express the will of the people. | |
| From: David van Reybrouck (Against Elections [2013], 2 'electoral') | |
| A reaction: Our recent Brexit referendum didn't do the job, because it was confined to a single question. Van Reybrouck laughs at the idea of expressing it through a polling both. How about a council of 500, drawn by lots? Meet for three months. |
| 20087 | There are no united monolothic 'peoples', and no 'national gut feelings' [Reybrouck] |
| Full Idea: There is no such thing as one monolithic 'people' (every society has its diversity), nor is there anything that could be described as a 'national gut feeling'. | |
| From: David van Reybrouck (Against Elections [2013], 2 'populism') | |
| A reaction: Rousseau yearned for a republic no bigger than Geneva. I don't see why we should give up on the general will in huge modern societies. It is likely, though, to be an anodyne lowest common denominator. No bad thing, perhaps. |
| 20089 | Technocrats may be efficient, but they lose legitimacy as soon as they do unpopular things [Reybrouck] |
| Full Idea: Efficiency does not automatically generate legitimacy, and faith in the technocrat melts away as soon as spending cuts are implemented. | |
| From: David van Reybrouck (Against Elections [2013], 2 'democracy') | |
| A reaction: They can hang on to legitimacy if they can come up with some technical mumbo-jumbo like 'monetarism' which the people will swallow. |
| 20088 | Technocrats are expert managers, who replace politicians, and can be long-term and unpopular [Reybrouck] |
| Full Idea: Technocracy is a system where experts are charged with looking after the public interest. ...Technocrats are managers who replace politicians, so they can concentrate on long-term solutions and announce unpopular measures. | |
| From: David van Reybrouck (Against Elections [2013], 2 'technocracy') | |
| A reaction: I like technocrats. They just need to be accountable. In the UK we have far more respect for the governor of the Bank of England than for any politician. |
| 20085 | Democracy is the best compromise between legitimacy and efficiency [Reybrouck] |
| Full Idea: Democracy is the least bad form of all governments precisely because it attempts to find a healthy balance between legitimacy and efficiency. | |
| From: David van Reybrouck (Against Elections [2013], 1 'Crisis') | |
| A reaction: There seems to be a widespread feeling that democracy is declining in efficiency, and that may be because our remoteness from government decreases legitimacy, so we have less commitment to getting things done. |
| 20095 | A referendum result arises largely from ignorance [Reybrouck] |
| Full Idea: In a referendum you ask everyone to vote on a subject that usually only a few know anything about. | |
| From: David van Reybrouck (Against Elections [2013], 4 'remedies') | |
| A reaction: Tell me about it! I was forced to vote in the 2016 Brexit referendum, and felt thoroughly out of my depth on such a complex economic question. |
| 20094 | You don't really govern people if you don't involve them [Reybrouck] |
| Full Idea: Even with the best of intentions, those who govern the people without involving them, govern them only in a limited sense. | |
| From: David van Reybrouck (Against Elections [2013], 4 intro) | |
| A reaction: But if they are highly involved, who is governing who? Do we want the people to become happier about being governed, or do we want them more involved in doing the governing? |
| 20093 | In the 18th century democratic lots lost out to elections, that gave us a non-hereditary aristocracy [Reybrouck] |
| Full Idea: The drawing of lots, the most democratic of all political instruments, lost out in the eighteenth century to elections, a procedure that was not invented as a democratic instrument, but as a means of bringing a new non-hereditary aristocracy to power. | |
| From: David van Reybrouck (Against Elections [2013], 3 'democratisation') | |
| A reaction: This is the basic thesis of Van Reybrouck's book. He argues for the extensive use of lots ('sortition') for getting people involved in modern democracies. I love the idea that in a good democracy you get an occasional chance to rule. |
| 20091 | Representative elections were developed in order to avoid democracy [Reybrouck] |
| Full Idea: Bernard Manin (1995) revealed how, immediately after the American and French revolutions, the electoral-representative system was chosen with the intention of keeping at bay the tumult of democracy. | |
| From: David van Reybrouck (Against Elections [2013], 3 'procedure') | |
| A reaction: At the time America and France were two of the largest countries in the world, and communication and transport were slow. That has changed. |
| 6005 | Animals are dangerous and nourishing, and can't form contracts of justice [Hermarchus, by Sedley] |
| Full Idea: Hermarchus said that animal killing is justified by considerations of human safety and nourishment and by animals' inability to form contractual relations of justice with us. | |
| From: report of Hermarchus (fragments/reports [c.270 BCE]) by David A. Sedley - Hermarchus | |
| A reaction: Could the last argument be used to justify torturing animals? Or could we eat a human who was too brain-damaged to form contracts? |