13 ideas
3798 | An overexamined life is as bad as an unexamined one [Dennett] |
Full Idea: The unexamined life may not be worth living, but the overexamined life is nothing to write home about either. | |
From: Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room: varieties of free will [1984], §4.2) | |
A reaction: Presumably he means a life which is all theory and no practice. Compare Idea 343. |
3801 | Rationality requires the assumption that things are either for better or worse [Dennett] |
Full Idea: We must assume that something matters - that some things are for better and some things are for worse, for without that our assumed rationality would have nothing on which to get a purchase. | |
From: Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room: varieties of free will [1984], §7.1) | |
A reaction: It does seem that rationality wouldn't exist as an activity without some value to motivate it. |
15923 | Poincaré rejected the actual infinite, claiming definitions gave apparent infinity to finite objects [Poincaré, by Lavine] |
Full Idea: Poincaré rejected the actual infinite. He viewed mathematics that is apparently concerned with the actual infinite as actually concerning the finite linguistic definitions the putatively describe actually infinite objects. | |
From: report of Henri Poincaré (On the Nature of Mathematical Reasoning [1894]) by Shaughan Lavine - Understanding the Infinite |
3802 | Why pronounce impossible what you cannot imagine? [Dennett] |
Full Idea: You say you cannot imagine that p, and therefore declare that p is impossible. Mightn't that be hubris? | |
From: Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room: varieties of free will [1984], §7.3) |
3795 | Causal theories require the "right" sort of link (usually unspecified) [Dennett] |
Full Idea: In causal theories of knowledge and reference, the causal chain between object and thought must be of the "right" sort - the nature of rightness to be specified later, typically. | |
From: Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room: varieties of free will [1984], §3.3 n14) | |
A reaction: This is now the standard objection to a purely causal account of reference. Which of the many causal chains causes the meaning? Knowledge of maths is a further problem for it. |
3797 | I am the sum total of what I directly control [Dennett] |
Full Idea: Control is the ultimate criterion of the self: I am the sum total of the parts I control directly. | |
From: Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room: varieties of free will [1984], §4.2) | |
A reaction: This looks awfully like a flagrant self-contradiction, and I think it is. It seems pretty obvious that there is at least a distinction between the bit or bits that do the controlling, and the bits that get controlled. |
3800 | You can be free even though force would have prevented you doing otherwise [Dennett, by PG] |
Full Idea: If a brain implant would compel you to perform an action which you in fact freely choose, then you are free, but couldn't have done otherwise. | |
From: report of Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room: varieties of free will [1984], §6.1) by PG - Db (ideas) |
3803 | Can we conceive of a being with a will freer than our own? [Dennett] |
Full Idea: Can I even conceive of beings whose wills are freer than our own? | |
From: Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room: varieties of free will [1984], §7.3) |
3794 | Foreknowledge permits control [Dennett] |
Full Idea: Foreknowledge is what permits control. | |
From: Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room: varieties of free will [1984], §3.2) |
3791 | Awareness of thought is a step beyond awareness of the world [Dennett] |
Full Idea: The creature who is not only sensitive to patterns in its environment, but also sensitive to patterns in its own reactions to patterns in its environment, has taken a major step. | |
From: Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room: varieties of free will [1984], §2.2) |
3796 | The active self is a fiction created because we are ignorant of our motivations [Dennett] |
Full Idea: Faced with our inability to 'see' where the centre or source of our free actions is,…we exploit the gaps in our self-knowledge by filling it with a mysterious entity, the unmoved mover, the active self. | |
From: Daniel C. Dennett (Elbow Room: varieties of free will [1984], §4.1) | |
A reaction: I am convinced that there is no such things as free will; its origins are to be found in religion, where it is a necessary feature of a very supreme God. I don't believe for a moment that we need to believe in free will. |
1748 | Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless [Archelaus, by Diog. Laertius] |
Full Idea: Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless. | |
From: report of Archelaus (fragments/reports [c.450 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.Ar.3 |
5989 | Archelaus said life began in a primeval slime [Archelaus, by Schofield] |
Full Idea: Archelaus wrote that life on Earth began in a primeval slime. | |
From: report of Archelaus (fragments/reports [c.450 BCE]) by Malcolm Schofield - Archelaus | |
A reaction: This sounds like a fairly clearcut assertion of the production of life by evolution. Darwin's contribution was to propose the mechanism for achieving it. We should honour the name of Archelaus for this idea. |