Combining Philosophers

All the ideas for Menedemus, Julia Annas and Steven Pinker

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23 ideas

1. Philosophy / C. History of Philosophy / 2. Ancient Philosophy / b. Pre-Socratic philosophy
12036 Xenophanes began the concern with knowledge [Annas]
1. Philosophy / C. History of Philosophy / 2. Ancient Philosophy / c. Classical philosophy
12046 Plato was the first philosopher who was concerned to systematize his ideas [Annas]
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 2. Reduction
7508 Good reductionism connects fields of knowledge, but doesn't replace one with another [Pinker]
12. Knowledge Sources / D. Empiricism / 2. Associationism
7510 Connectionists say the mind is a general purpose learning device [Pinker]
12. Knowledge Sources / E. Direct Knowledge / 4. Memory
7513 Is memory stored in protein sequences, neurons, synapses, or synapse-strengths? [Pinker]
16. Persons / F. Free Will / 5. Against Free Will
7509 Roundworms live successfully with 302 neurons, so human freedom comes from our trillions [Pinker]
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 4. Connectionism
7511 Neural networks can generalise their training, e.g. truths about tigers apply mostly to lions [Pinker]
7512 There are five types of reasoning that seem beyond connectionist systems [Pinker, by PG]
20. Action / C. Motives for Action / 3. Acting on Reason / a. Practical reason
3546 'Phronesis' should translate as 'practical intelligence', not as prudence [Annas]
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / b. Rational ethics
12037 Euripides's Medea is a key case of reason versus the passions [Annas]
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / e. Human nature
7505 Many think that accepting human nature is to accept innumerable evils [Pinker]
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 3. Pleasure / d. Sources of pleasure
3547 Epicureans achieve pleasure through character development [Annas]
23. Ethics / A. Egoism / 1. Ethical Egoism
3031 The greatest good is not the achievement of desire, but to desire what is proper [Menedemus, by Diog. Laertius]
23. Ethics / A. Egoism / 3. Cyrenaic School
3543 Cyrenaics pursue pleasure, but don't equate it with happiness [Annas]
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 1. Virtue Theory / a. Nature of virtue
12040 Virtue is a kind of understanding of moral value [Annas]
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / c. Motivation for virtue
3541 Ancient ethics uses attractive notions, not imperatives [Annas]
23. Ethics / D. Deontological Ethics / 1. Deontology
3550 Principles cover life as a whole, where rules just cover actions [Annas]
23. Ethics / D. Deontological Ethics / 2. Duty
3551 Virtue theory tries to explain our duties in terms of our character [Annas]
23. Ethics / D. Deontological Ethics / 6. Motivation for Duty
3552 If excessively good actions are admirable but not required, then duty isn't basic [Annas]
23. Ethics / E. Utilitarianism / 1. Utilitarianism
3542 We should do good when necessary, not maximise it [Annas]
27. Natural Reality / G. Biology / 2. Life
7516 In 1828, the stuff of life was shown to be ordinary chemistry, not a magic gel [Pinker]
27. Natural Reality / G. Biology / 3. Evolution
7515 All the evidence says evolution is cruel and wasteful, not intelligent [Pinker]
7514 Intelligent Design says that every unexplained phenomenon must be design, by default [Pinker]