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Overview
Custom then, is the great guide of human life. It is that principle alone which renders our experience useful to us, and makes us expect, for the future, a similar train of events with those which have appeared in the past. (Hume, David S. "Concerning Human Understanding" Section V, Part I, 36)
John Locke believed that all people were equal and independent, and that no one had the right to harm another's "life, health, liberty, or possessions." Locke was not only a renowned philosopher in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries,but he was an Oxford scholar, medical researcher and physician, political operative, economist and spokesman for a revolutionary movement.
30/11/2008 when we analyze our thoughts or ideas, however compounded or sublime, we always find that they resolve themselves into such simple ideas as were copied from a precedent feeling or sentiment. Even those ideas, which at first view, seem the most wide of this origin, are found, upon a nearer scrutiny, to be derived from it. The idea of God, as meaning an infinitely intelligent, wise, and good Being, arises from reflecting on the operations of our own mind, and augmenting, without limit, those qualities of goodness and wisdom. (Hume, David S. "Concerning Human Understanding" Section II, 14)
Rorty is not asking us to abandon Dewey. Instead he attempts to show how Dewey, in his quest for a metaphysics, loses his direction and falls prey to his own criticism. Rorty avoids selective emphasis. He does not ask us to use any specific as a starting point. Instead, he suggests that we allow experiences and the problems faced by current society to lead us into philosophic discovery. Dewey was close he had the right tools to do the job to develop his scientific method, he just used the wrong tools for the job. Instead of accepting Locke's starting point, what he needed was Locke's version of causal processes. Instead of using Hegel's version of causal processes, what he needed was Hegel's starting point or the current society. In this way, we can do what Dewey wished; the use of reflection and criticism toward better and more enhanced meaning and value. Meaning and value will be enhanced by using current society as a means for empirical study, and by using only the natural or nature in the empirical method. We cannot use artificial stimuli in empirical studies. We must use the real thing, nature. If we use Locke as a starting point, our reflection and criticism are meaningless, because they have no basis upon current society.
24/11/2008 The Common Love is for those with weak hearts and the inability to see past the physical to the inner beauty. This is also the Love most experience in the latter half of the twentieth Century. We know longer fall in love with a person because of who they are inside, and what the stand for in life. Today, we fall in love for what people are, what they look like, and what kind of job they have. This is Common Love, if we would search for Heavenly Love inside those around us, we would be much happier. Heavenly Love is the love of those with high virtue. Virtue, honor and goodness are the most beautiful qualities of mankind. The person who deserves your love is those who treat you kindly, with the most honor, virtue, and goodness. Common Love is the love of young boys and women. It is the Love of lust, and the vulgar love of the physical body. It is the love of wealth and power and is fleeting. Noble Love, the Love of the older Aphrodite is lasting. Common Love causes man to act irrationally, emotionally. It is this type of love that causes jealousy and anger in mates.
If philosophy be criticism, what is to be said of the relation of philosophy to metaphysics? For metaphysics, as a statement of the generic traits manifested by existences of all kinds without regard to their differentiation into physical and mental, seems to have nothing to do with criticism and choice, with an effective love of wisdom. It begins and ends with analysis and definition. When it has revealed the traits and characters that are sure to turn up in every universe of discourse, its work is done. So at least an argument may run. But the very nature of the traits discovered in every theme of discourse, since they are ineluctable traits of natural existence, forbids such a conclusion. (Dewey, P. 412-413)
28/11/2008 But no man, having seen only one body move after being impelled by another, could infer that every other body will move after a like impulse. All inferences from experience, therefore, are effects of customs, not of reasoning.
However, in Machiavelli's time, as it is today, the States whole reason for being was to serve the citizens, not vice versa. Machiavelli believed the only purpose for a ruler was to make war, and protect its citizens from attacks by other states. The ruler, therefore, is justified in doing whatever is necessary to maintain the country, even if it is unjust. Plato argues a ruler can never be unjust.
21/11/2008 The concept of a tripartite agency of existence: body, soul, and god, does not completely parallel to Plato either. Plato believed in the physical world, the world of forms, and the greatest form of all: good. A superficial inspection would correlate these to body, soul, and god respectively, but this cannot work. First off, the world of forms, in Platonic terms, equates to god himself according to Augustine. The greatest form of all, however, can be no other than god as well. Plato's third realm, the realm of the perceivable, then must correlate to both Augustine's "body" and his "soul." This, however, cannot be since it is Plato's realm of forms which is also the realm of intellect, a concept paralleling Augustine's "soul." So apparently, Augustine has also created a third segment of Plato's divided line.
In Hume's "Enquiry Concerning Human Nature," he seeks to bring insight to the masses regarding the absurdity of religious belief. Hume uncovers a lack of evidence associated with fervent religious belief and contends that wise individuals have the sense to separate themselves from partaking in this passionate faith. The foundation that Hume's argument rests upon is that no causal relationship can be inferred from one experience to another. Mankind can only predict the future with a degree of certainty based on past experiences, although they can never be absolutely sure that X will always follow Y, even if in the past this has been the case.
Machiavelli is naive, and in many ways promotes violence, if it justifies the ends to a means, "virtu". However, in so doing, he also exposes Monarchy as a fraud, and offers a way of separating morali...
Likewise, the soldier going to fight the enemy sometimes has the right to refuse. The soldier has the right to transfer his service by paying another to take his place (269). A soldier may also run aw...
How (it may be asked) can any part of the conduct of a member of society be a matter of indifference to the other members? No person is an entirely isolated being; it is impossible for a person to do ...
Usually, for beginners the best places to gather information about this re-emerging and mysterious topic, is at local lectures or workshops. Other resources may be the library or people who are intere...
In so doing, he develops a new philosophical way of looking at the world. Instead of viewing things only objectively, Descartes throws in the subjective. This type of philosophy became the basis for a...
If the route of knowledge is through a lecture pertaining to one of the above mentioned subjects or a similar subject, the following fictitious examples can help to zero in on what to look for in a me...
The Manifesto is an interesting document that clearly outlines Marx' views on capitalist society and historical development. The Manifesto is very exact and penetrating. It outlines the historical dev...
when we analyze our thoughts or ideas, however compounded or sublime, we always find that they resolve themselves into such simple ideas as were copied from a precedent feeling or sentiment. Even thos...
Gross experience is loaded with the tangled and complex; hence philosophy hurries away from it to search out something so simple that the mind can rest trustfully in it, knowing that it has no surpris...
Dewey opened up the door between empirical philosophy and the arts. The scientific method of discovery combined with the values of the current culture produce new beliefs or meanings. One is contingen...
If the route of knowledge is through a lecture pertaining to one of the above mentioned subjects or a similar subject, the following fictitious examples can help to zero in on what to look for in a me...
It is custom alone, which engages animals, from every object, that strikes their senses, to infer its usual attendant, and carries their imagination, from the appearance of the one, to conceive the ot...
The nineteenth century philosopher John Stuart Mill believed that for man to be truly free the rights and liberties of the individual must be guaranteed. Mill was concerned with what he called "Civil ...
In defense of his teacher, and to disclose to all the truth of Socrates trial, Plato writes his version of the truth as he heard it. In the Apology Plato writes from the persona of his teacher, in the...
The discussion in part I on despair and the causes and results of this despair is a fairly scientific description of observable phenomenon in the human psyche. The dialectical method of examination of...
Dewey's work helps us put aside that spirit of seriousness which artists traditionally lack and philosophers are traditionally supposed to maintain. For the spirit of seriousness can only exist in an ...
The response of the skeptics is to claim that daily reality contradicts Plato, and that contrary to number one, tyrants, motivated by unjust principles, may be found to be happy. Moroever, they argue ...
Dewey wanted to be as naturalistic as Locke and as historic as Hegel. This can indeed be done. One can say with Locke that the causal process that go in the human organism suffice, without the intrusi...
The Socrates Plato describes refuses to accept payment for formal instruction, and had no school. Socrates taught by asking questions and inducing debate. The truth can only be discovered by eliminati...
Most of Hobbes' conclusions are merely assertions, such as his explanations of what is and is not injustice regarding an individuals acts toward the state. It is ambiguous why certain rights are forfe...
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