46 ideas
| 7578 | I conceived it my task to create difficulties everywhere [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: I conceived it my task to create difficulties everywhere. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], 'Author') | |
| A reaction: Nice. It is like Socrates's image of himself as the 'gadfly' of Athens. The interesting question is always to see what the rest of society makes of having someone in their midst who sees it as their social role to 'create difficulties'. |
| 22047 | Wherever there is painless contradiction there is also comedy [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: Wherever there is contradiction, the comical is also present. ...The tragic is the suffering contradiction, the comical is the painless contradiction. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], p.459), quoted by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 13 | |
| A reaction: He is not saying that this is the only source of comedy. I once heard an adult say that there is one thing that is always funny, and that is a fart. |
| 22092 | Kierkegaard's truth draws on authenticity, fidelity and honesty [Kierkegaard, by Carlisle] |
| Full Idea: Kierkegaard offers a different interpretation of truth, which draws on the notions of authenticity, fidelity and honesty. | |
| From: report of Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846]) by Clare Carlisle - Kierkegaard: a guide for the perplexed 4 | |
| A reaction: This notion of truth, meaning 'the real thing' (as in 'she was a true scholar'), seems to begin with Hegel. I suggest we use the word 'genuine' for that, and save 'truth' for its traditional role. It is disastrous to blur the simple concept of truth. |
| 15999 | Pure truth is for infinite beings only; I prefer endless striving for truth [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: If God held all truth enclosed in his right hand, and in his left hand the ever-striving drive for truth, even if erring forever, and he were to say Choose! I would humbly fall at his left hand and say Father, give! Pure truth is for infinite beings only. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], p.106) | |
| A reaction: A sobering realistic thought of our own limitations; Kierkegaard allows that there is no limit to how far we can strive for truth. Just that truth is comprehended by infinite beings (if any), not by mere mortals. [SY] |
| 20313 | The highest truth we can get is uncertainty held fast by an inward passion [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: An objective uncertainty held fast in an appropriation-process of the most passionate inwardness is the truth, the highest truth available for an existing individual. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846]) | |
| A reaction: [Bk 711] Offered as a definition of truth, knowing how strange and paradoxical it sounds. If we view all life as subjectivity, then there can of course be nothing more to truth than passionate conviction. Personally I think thought can be objective. |
| 3593 | The only way to specify the corresponding fact is asserting the sentence [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: The trouble with appeal to facts in the correspondence theory is that, in general, we have no way of indicating what fact a sentence, when true, corresponds to other than asserting the sentence. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.12) |
| 3584 | Justification needs coherence, while truth might be ideal coherence [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: Contemporary coherence theorists are advancing a theory of justification, not of truth, …with those who argue that truth is also coherence explaining it in terms of ideal coherence, or coherence at the limit of enquiry. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.10) |
| 3585 | Coherence needs positive links, not just absence of conflict [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: It is often claimed that coherence is more than 'absence of conflict' between beliefs; it also involves 'positive connections'. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.10) |
| 3599 | Deduction shows entailments, not what to believe [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: The rules of deduction are rules of entailment, not rules of inference. They tell us what follows from what, not what to believe on the basis of what. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.18) |
| 3591 | We could never pin down how many beliefs we have [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: Asking how many beliefs I have is like asking how many drops of water there are in a bucket. If I believe my dog is in the garden, do I also believe he is not in the house, or in Siberia? | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.11) |
| 3582 | Propositions make error possible, so basic experiential knowledge is impossible [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: Propositional content is inseparable from possible error. Therefore no judgement, however modest, is indubitable. So if basic experiential knowledge has to be indubitable, there is no such knowledge. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 8) |
| 3592 | Phenomenalism is a form of idealism [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: Phenomenalism is a form of idealism. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.12) |
| 3579 | Sense data avoid the danger of misrepresenting the world [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: The point of insisting on the absolute immediacy of sense data is that representation always seems to involve the possibility of misrepresentation. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 8) |
| 3581 | Sense data can't give us knowledge if they are non-propositional [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: Acquaintance with sense data is supposed to be a form of non-propositional knowledge, but how can something be non-propositional and yet knowledge? | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 8) |
| 3564 | Is it people who are justified, or propositions? [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: What exactly is supposed to be 'justified': a person's believing some particular proposition, or the proposition that he believes? | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 1) | |
| A reaction: A key distinction. See my comment on Idea 3752. What would justify a sign saying 'treasure buried here'? People can be justified in believing falsehoods. How could a false proposition be justified? |
| 3595 | What works always takes precedence over theories [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: A theory that represents working practices as unworkable is a bad theory. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.13) | |
| A reaction: Good point. There's a lot of this about in epistemology, especially accusations of circularity or infinite regress, which (if true) don't somehow seem to worry the cove on the Clapham omnibus. |
| 3580 | Experience must be meaningful to act as foundations [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: If we are to treat experience as the foundation of knowledge, then experience must itself be understood to involve propositional content. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 8) | |
| A reaction: This sounds right, but since pure 'experience' obviously doesn't have propositional content, because it needs interpretation and evaluation, then this strategy won't work. |
| 3578 | Are empirical foundations judgements or experiences? [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: Empirical foundationists must decide whether knowledge ultimately rests on either beliefs or judgements about experience, or on the experiences or sensations themselves. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 8) | |
| A reaction: This clarifies the key issue very nicely, and I firmly vote for the former option. The simplest point is that error is possible about what sensations are taken to be of, so they won't do on their own. |
| 3576 | Foundationalists are torn between adequacy and security [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: The foundationalists dilemma is to define a basis for knowledge modest enough to be secure but rich enough to be adequate. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 7) | |
| A reaction: ..And that is just what they are unable to do, precisely because adequate support would have to have enough content to be defeasibe or fallible. |
| 3577 | Strong justification eliminates error, but also reduces our true beliefs [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: A strongly justificationist view of rationality may not be so rational; we want the truth, but avoiding all errors and maximising our number of true beliefs are not the same thing. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 7) | |
| A reaction: An interesting dilemma - to avoid all errors, believing nothing; to maximise true belief, believe everything. It is rational to follow intuition, guesses, and a wing and a prayer - once you are experienced and educated. |
| 3590 | Coherence theory must give a foundational status to coherence itself [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: Coherence theory implicitly assigns the criteria of coherence a special status. …In so far as this status is assigned a priori, the coherence theory represents a rationalistic variant of foundationalism. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.11) | |
| A reaction: Nice move, to accuse coherence theorists of foundationalism! Wrong, though, because the a priori principles of coherence are not basic beliefs, but evolved pragmatic procedures (or something...). |
| 3589 | Why should diverse parts of our knowledge be connected? [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: Why should political theory ever have much to do with quantum physics, or pet care with parliamentary history? | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.11) | |
| A reaction: This hardly demolishes the coherence account of justification, since your views on pet care had better be coherent, for your pet's sake. It's a pity people can make their politics cohere with their ethics. |
| 3571 | Externalism does not require knowing that you know [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: From an externalist point of view, knowing about one's reliability is not required for 'first-order' knowledge. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 2) | |
| A reaction: Ah. 'First-order knowledge' - what's that? What we used to call 'true belief', I would say. Adequate for animals, and a good guide to daily life, but uncritical and unjustifiable. |
| 3574 | Externalism ignores the social aspect of knowledge [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: A problem with pure externalism is that it ignores the social dimension of knowledge. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 2) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be contradicted by Idea 3573, which allows a social dimension to agreement over what is reliable. I am inclined to take knowledge as an entirely social concept. |
| 3567 | How could there be causal relations to mathematical facts? [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: It is not clear what would even be meant by supposing that there are causal relations to mathematical facts. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 2) | |
| A reaction: I agree, though platonists seem to be willing to entertain the possibility that there are causal relations, for which no further explanation can be given. Better is knowledge without a causal relation. |
| 3569 | In the causal theory of knowledge the facts must cause the belief [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: According to Goldman's early causal theory of knowledge, my belief that p counts as knowledge if and only if it is caused by the fact that p. This is sufficient as well as necessary, and so does not involve justification. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 2) | |
| A reaction: I take his theory simply to be false because what causes a belief is not what justifies it. I expect my mother to ring; the phone rings; I 'know' it is my mother (and it is), because I strongly expect it. |
| 3586 | Only a belief can justify a belief [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: Justification requires logical rather than causal connections. That is the point of the slogan that only a belief can justify a belief. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.10) | |
| A reaction: It seems better to talk of 'rational' connections, rather than 'logical' connections. It isn't 'logical' to believe that someone despises me because their lip is faintly curled. |
| 3573 | Externalist reliability refers to a range of conventional conditions [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: The radical externalists' key notion is 'reliability', which is a normative condition governing adequate performance, involving reference to a range of conditions which we decide rather than discover. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 2) | |
| A reaction: If we can decide whether a source is reliable, we can also decide whether a reliable source has performed well on this occasion, and that will always take precedence. |
| 3565 | Sometimes I ought to distrust sources which are actually reliable [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: I may reach a belief using a procedure that is in fact reliable, but which I ought to distrust. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 1) | |
| A reaction: The tramp on the park bench who gives good share tips. The clock that is finally working, but has been going haywire for weeks. Reliabilism is a bad theory. |
| 3566 | We control our beliefs by virtue of how we enquire [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: We control our beliefs by virtue of how we enquire. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 1) |
| 3594 | Scepticism just reveals our limited ability to explain things [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: All the sceptic's arguments show is that there are limits to our capacity to give reasons or cite evidence. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.13) |
| 3575 | Scepticism can involve discrepancy, relativity, infinity, assumption and circularity [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: The classical Five Modes of Scepticism are Discrepancy (people always disagree), Relativity ('according to you'), Infinity (infinite regress of questions), Assumption (ending in dogma) and Circularity (end up where you started). | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch. 5) | |
| A reaction: I take Relativity to be different from scepticism (because, roughly, it says there is nothing to know), and the others go with Agrippa's Trilemma of justification, which may have solutions. |
| 3587 | Seeing electrons in a cloud chamber requires theory [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: Armed with enough theory, we can see electrons in a cloud chamber. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.10) |
| 20742 | The real subject is ethical, not cognitive [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: The real subject is not the cognitive subject …the real subject is the ethically existing subject. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], p.281), quoted by Kevin Aho - Existentialism: an introduction 2 'Subjective' | |
| A reaction: Perhaps we should say the essence of the self is its drive to live, not its drive to know. Just getting through the day is top priority, and ethics don’t figure much for the solitary person. But each activity, such as cooking, has its virtues. |
| 3588 | Foundationalists base meaning in words, coherentists base it in sentences [Williams,M] |
| Full Idea: In the foundationalist picture the meaning of individual words (defined ostensively) is primary, and that of sentences is derivative. For coherentists sentences come first, with meaning understood functionally or inferentially. | |
| From: Michael Williams (Problems of Knowledge [2001], Ch.10) | |
| A reaction: Coherentism about language doesn't imply coherentism about justification. On language I vote for foundationalism, because I am impressed by the phenomenon of compositionality. |
| 7579 | While big metaphysics is complete without ethics, personal philosophy emphasises ethics [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: While the Hegelian philosophy goes on and is finished without having an Ethics, the more simple philosophy which is propounded by an existing individual for existing individuals, will more especially emphasis the ethical. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], 'Lessing') | |
| A reaction: This is reminiscent of the Socratic revolution, which shifted philosophy from the study of nature to the study of personal virtue. However, if we look for ethical teachings in existentialism, there often seems to be a black hole in the middle. |
| 7581 | Speculative philosophy loses the individual in a vast vision of humanity [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: Being an individual man is a thing that has been abolished, and every speculative philosopher confuses himself with humanity at large, whereby he becomes infinitely great - and at the same time nothing at all. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], 'Lessing') | |
| A reaction: Compare Idea 4840. This is a beautiful statement of the motivation for existentialism. The sort of philosophers who love mathematics (Plato, Descartes, Leibniz, Russell) love losing themselves in abstractions. This is the rebellion. |
| 20314 | People want to lose themselves in movements and history, instead of being individuals [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: Everything must attach itself so as to be part of some movement; men are determined to lose themselves in the totality of things, in world-history, fascinated and deceived by a magic witchery; no one wants to be an individual human being. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846]) | |
| A reaction: [Bk 711] I presume 'world-history' refers to the exhilerating ideas of Hegel. Right now [2017] I would say we have far too much of people only wanting to be individuals, with insufficient attention to our social nature. |
| 7582 | Becoming what one is is a huge difficulty, because we strongly aspire to be something else [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: Striving to become what one already is is a very difficult task, the most difficult of all, because every human being has a strong natural bent and passion to become something more and different. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], 'Subjective') | |
| A reaction: Presumably most people continually drift between vanity and low self-esteem, and between unattainable daydreams and powerless immediate reality. That creates the stage on which Kierkegaard's interesting battle would have to be fought. |
| 13304 | Learned men gain more in one day than others do in a lifetime [Posidonius] |
| Full Idea: In a single day there lies open to men of learning more than there ever does to the unenlightened in the longest of lifetimes. | |
| From: Posidonius (fragments/reports [c.95 BCE]), quoted by Seneca the Younger - Letters from a Stoic 078 | |
| A reaction: These remarks endorsing the infinite superiority of the educated to the uneducated seem to have been popular in late antiquity. It tends to be the religions which discourage great learning, especially in their emphasis on a single book. |
| 20820 | Time is an interval of motion, or the measure of speed [Posidonius, by Stobaeus] |
| Full Idea: Posidonius defined time thus: it is an interval of motion, or the measure of speed and slowness. | |
| From: report of Posidonius (fragments/reports [c.95 BCE]) by John Stobaeus - Anthology 1.08.42 | |
| A reaction: Hm. Can we define motion or speed without alluding to time? Looks like we have to define them as a conjoined pair, which means we cannot fully understand either of them. |
| 7586 | God does not think or exist; God creates, and is eternal [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: God does not think, He creates; God does not exist, he is eternal. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], 'Thinker') | |
| A reaction: The sort of nicely challenging remarks we pay philosophers to come up with. I don't understand the second claim, but the first one certainly avoids all paradoxes that arise if God experiences all the intrinsic problems of thinking. |
| 20312 | God cannot be demonstrated objectively, because God is a subject, only existing inwardly [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: Choosing the objective way enters upon the entire approximation-process by which it is proposed to bring God to light objectively. But this is in all eternity impossible, because God is a subject, and therefore exist only for subjectivity in inwardness. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846]) | |
| A reaction: [pg in 711] This seems to have something like Wittgenstein's problem with a private language - that with no external peer-review it is unclear what the commitment is. |
| 7580 | Pantheism destroys the distinction between good and evil [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: So called pantheistic systems have often been characterised and challenged by the assertion that they abrogate the distinction between good and evil. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], 'Lessing') | |
| A reaction: He will have Spinoza in mind. Interesting. Obviously this criticism would come from someone who thought that the traditional deity was the only source of goodness. Good/evil isn't all-or-nothing. A monistic system could contain them. |
| 7584 | Without risk there is no faith [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: Without risk there is no faith. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], 'Inwardness') | |
| A reaction: Remarks like this make you realise that Kierkegaard is just as much of a romantic as most of the other nineteenth century philosophers. Plunge into the dark unknown of the human psyche, in order to intensify and heighten human life. |
| 7583 | Faith is the highest passion in the sphere of human subjectivity [Kierkegaard] |
| Full Idea: Faith is the highest passion in the sphere of human subjectivity. | |
| From: Søren Kierkegaard (Concluding Unscientific Postscript [1846], 'Subjective') | |
| A reaction: The word 'highest' should always ring alarm bells. The worst sort of religious fanatics seem to be in the grip of this 'high' passion. The early twenty-first century is an echo of eighteenth century England, with its dislike of religious 'enthusiasm'. |