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| Author: |
zoe |
| Blog URL: |
http://www.handshakesdemo.com/blogs/reason
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| Tags: |
example hold fly earth may need place air together world |
| Description: |
| Augustine seems to have practically plagiarized Plato. Substitute "god" for "the good" and "the divine" for "the forms" and there you have it: Augustine's philosophy. He even adopts the technique of argument by analogy from Plato. It is interesting to note the inconsistencies in Augustine's own comparison to Platonic theory. Plato considered the forms to be the greater knowledge attainable only by philosophers and those with a truly rational soul. Thus, understanding of forms is a rational process |
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Simone de Beauvoir is obviously trying to address the weakest point of Sartre's philosophical exposition of existentialism -- what sort of value system arises from the existential outlook? De Beauvoir wants to show how existential assumptions actually do lead to an ethics of a non-classical sort. In speaking of the freedom of men from the deterministic bounds of society, religion, or the material world de Beauvoir states: "[I]t appears to us that by turning toward this freedom we are going to discover a principle of action whose range will be universal (23)." This seems to be an important point as it addresses directly the accusation that the very "existential freedom" of man is a destructive and horrific isolation of each individual into self-justifying random action. Later de Beauvoir states that it is actually freedom itself which is this universal. "At the same time that [freedom] requires the realization of concrete ends, of particular projects, it requires itself universally (24)." She then continues to set up an equality between being free and being moral. Even considering the starting point of ambiguity, how can freedom in terms of consciousness become the basis for any morality? So whatever you do is moral as long as you choose to do it?
John Dewey reflected upon the traditional philosophic works and saw that they were out of tune with a world that is constantly changing. The goal of traditional philosophy was to discover concrete truths from which to build a philosophical metaphysics. Dewey realized that truth is dependent upon many different factors (instruments), and changes according to those factors. Dewey asks is philosophy the search for truth or the best way to find the truth? He defends the idea that concrete truth cannot be obtained, therefore; the best thing to do is find what is the true meaning according to the values we place upon it our current culture. Therefore, in the 14th Century the idea that the world was flat and the sun, moon, and planets was true, because according to the facts available to that culture it was the best theory they could muster. Dewey recognizes the importance of the context, situation and problem we are involved with and uses reflection and criticism to dispute former philosophies and cure them of any ills they have; specifically, there use of selective emphasis. In "Dewey's Metaphysics," Richard Rorty accuses John Dewey of the greatest sin a philosopher can make. Dewey, according to Rorty, is guilty of his own criticism. Dewey's goal of developing a Naturalistic Metaphysics, or a god's eye view of the world, places a precondition, a selective emphasis on his philosophy which is the same mistake made by the philosophers he criticized.
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