58 ideas
| 1553 | No perceptible object is truly straight or curved [Protagoras] |
| 1549 | Everything that exists consists in being perceived [Protagoras] |
| 1545 | Protagoras was the first to claim that there are two contradictory arguments about everything [Protagoras, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 1547 | Man is the measure of all things - of things that are, and of things that are not [Protagoras] |
| 3305 | There is no more purely metaphysical doctrine than Protagorean relativism [Benardete,JA on Protagoras] |
| 3313 | If my hot wind is your cold wind, then wind is neither hot nor cold, and so not as cold as itself [Benardete,JA on Protagoras] |
| 3317 | You can only state the problem of the relative warmth of an object by agreeing on the underlying object [Benardete,JA on Protagoras] |
| 247 | God is "the measure of all things", more than any man [Plato on Protagoras] |
| 606 | Protagoras absurdly thought that the knowing or perceiving man is 'the measure of all things' [Aristotle on Protagoras] |
| 612 | Relativists think if you poke your eye and see double, there must be two things [Aristotle on Protagoras] |
| 23590 | Criminal responsibility can be fully assigned to each member of a group [Walzer] |
| 23578 | Double Effect needs a double intention - to achieve the good, and minimise the evil [Walzer] |
| 23564 | Deep ethical theory is very controversial, but we have to live with higher ethical practice [Walzer] |
| 6016 | Early sophists thought convention improved nature; later they said nature was diminished by it [Protagoras, by Miller,FD] |
| 23529 | Conduct is not isolated from its effect on the moral code [Hart,HLA] |
| 1580 | For Protagoras the only bad behaviour is that which interferes with social harmony [Protagoras, by Roochnik] |
| 205 | Protagoras contradicts himself by saying virtue is teachable, but then that it is not knowledge [Plato on Protagoras] |
| 20595 | You can't distribute goods from behind a veil, because their social meaning is unclear [Walzer, by Tuckness/Wolf] |
| 23530 | The great danger of democracy is that the oppression of the minority becomes unobjectionable [Hart,HLA] |
| 23522 | In an organised society all actions have some effect on other people [Hart,HLA] |
| 23528 | The value of liberty allows freedom of action, even if that distresses other people [Hart,HLA] |
| 20592 | Complex equality restricts equalities from spilling over, like money influencing politics and law [Walzer, by Tuckness/Wolf] |
| 20549 | Equality is complex, with different spheres of equality where different principles apply [Walzer, by Swift] |
| 21004 | Hart (against Bentham) says human rights are what motivate legal rights [Hart,HLA, by Sen] |
| 23568 | If whole states possess rights, there can be social relations between states [Walzer] |
| 20932 | Positive law needs secondary 'rules of recognition' for their correct application [Hart,HLA, by Zimmermann,J] |
| 23523 | The principle of legality requires crimes to be precisely defined in advance of any action [Hart,HLA] |
| 23524 | Some private moral issues are no concern of the law [Hart,HLA] |
| 23521 | Do morals influence law? Is morality an aspect of law? Can law be morally criticised? [Hart,HLA] |
| 23525 | Is the enforcement of morality morally justifiable? [Hart,HLA] |
| 23526 | Modern law still suppresses practices seen as immoral, and yet harmless [Hart,HLA] |
| 20931 | Hart replaced positivism with the democratic requirement of the people's acceptance [Hart,HLA, by Zimmermann,J] |
| 1659 | Protagoras seems to have made the huge move of separating punishment from revenge [Protagoras, by Vlastos] |
| 23527 | Moral wickedness of an offence is always relevant to the degree of punishment [Hart,HLA] |
| 23567 | Even non-violent intrusive acts between states count as aggression, if they justify resistance [Walzer] |
| 23570 | The only good reason for fighting is in defence of rights [Walzer] |
| 23571 | States can rightly pre-empt real and serious threats [Walzer] |
| 23582 | Reprisal is defensible, as an alternative to war [Walzer] |
| 23580 | States need not endure attacks passively, and successful reprisals are legitimate [Walzer] |
| 23588 | With nuclear weapons we have a permanent supreme emergency (which is unstable) [Walzer] |
| 23581 | The aim of reprisals is to enforce the rules of war [Walzer] |
| 23572 | Just wars are self-defence, or a rightful intercession in another's troubles [Walzer] |
| 23587 | Nuclear bombs are not for normal war; they undermine the 'just war', with a new morality [Walzer] |
| 23577 | Napoleon said 'I don't care about the deaths of a million men' [Walzer] |
| 23593 | Jus ad bellum and Jus in bello are independent; unjust wars can be fought in a just way [Walzer] |
| 23573 | For moral reasons, a just war must be a limited war [Walzer] |
| 23614 | Even aggressor soldiers are not criminals, so they have equal rights with their opponents [Walzer] |
| 23574 | The duties and moral status of loyal and obedient soldiers is the same in defence and aggression [Walzer] |
| 23575 | We can't blame soldiers for anything they do which clearly promotes victory [Walzer] |
| 23584 | Rejecting Combatant Equality allows just soldiers to be harsher, even to the extreme [Walzer] |
| 23589 | Kidnapped sailors and volunteers have different obligations to the passengers [Walzer] |
| 23579 | Soldiers will only protect civilians if they feel safe from them [Walzer] |
| 23586 | What matters in war is unacceptable targets, not unacceptable weapons [Walzer] |
| 23591 | If the oppressor is cruel, nonviolence is either surrender, or a mere gesture [Walzer] |
| 23592 | We can only lead war towards peace if we firmly enforce the rules of war [Walzer] |
| 532 | Successful education must go deep into the soul [Protagoras] |
| 1552 | He spent public money on education, as it benefits the individual and the state [Protagoras, by Diodorus of Sicily] |
| 1551 | He said he didn't know whether there are gods - but this is the same as atheism [Diogenes of Oen. on Protagoras] |