5 ideas
| 9218 | Maybe what distinguishes philosophy from science is its pursuit of necessary truths [Sider] |
| Full Idea: According to one tradition, necessary truth demarcates philosophical from empirical inquiry. Science identifies contingent aspects of the world, whereas philosophical inquiry reveals the essential nature of its objects. | |
| From: Theodore Sider (Reductive Theories of Modality [2003], 1) | |
| A reaction: I don't think there is a clear demarcation, and I would think that lots of generalizations about contingent truths are in philosophical territory, but I quite like this idea - even if it does make scientists laugh at philosophers. |
| 468 | Musical performance can reveal a range of virtues [Damon of Ath.] |
| Full Idea: In singing and playing the lyre, a boy will be likely to reveal not only courage and moderation, but also justice. | |
| From: Damon (fragments/reports [c.460 BCE], B4), quoted by (who?) - where? |
| 22485 | Non-cognitivists give the conditions of use of moral sentences as facts about the speaker [Foot] |
| Full Idea: What all these [non-cognitivist] theories try to do is to give the conditions of use of sentences such as 'It is morally objectionable to break promises', in terms of something which must be true about the speaker. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Does Moral Subjectivism Rest on a Mistake? [1995], p.192) | |
| A reaction: A wonderfully simple and accurate analysis of this view. Compare analysing 'there is a bus coming towards you' in the same way. Sounds silly, but lots of modern philosophers see things that way. |
| 22486 | The mistake is to think good grounds aren't enough for moral judgement, which also needs feelings [Foot] |
| Full Idea: The mistake is to think that whatever 'grounds' for a moral judgement may have been given, someone may be unready, indeed unable, to make the moral judgement, because he has not got the attitude or feeling. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Does Moral Subjectivism Rest on a Mistake? [1995], p.192) | |
| A reaction: This is roughly the Frege-Geach problem for expressivism, of how we still make moral judgements about situations where we ourselves are entirely disinterested (such as ancient historical events). |
| 22487 | Moral arguments are grounded in human facts [Foot] |
| Full Idea: The grounding of a moral argument is ultimately in facts about human life. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Does Moral Subjectivism Rest on a Mistake? [1995], p.207) | |
| A reaction: The best slogan I can find for summarising Foot's metaethics. The facts she refers to the basic human needs. She is right, and this almost bridges the fact-value divide (as long as you give a damn about human needs). |