...no further analysis needed.
— Banno
But there is. In 'Brute Facts' Anscombe is quite clear that this meaning is not an absolute one. There is an uncountable (un-listable) set of circumstances under which that is not the meaning of the transaction - the spuds were provided as part of a film, the spuds were a gift, the spuds were given out under charity...etc. — Isaac
Does anyone have a better PDF? Uncopyable and unsearchable, it's like I was an undergrad again... — Banno
I don't think that this counts as further analysis; because the criteria are not listable — Banno
So, what role does she leave to dissidents? — David Mo
Nothing and no one can prevent the moral subject from evaluating the decisions of the majority. — David Mo
(I think the publication dates of this paper and Philosophical Investigations are pretty close - both early fifties, but perhaps some experts here could confirm that). — Isaac
I don't see that the principle of autonomy implies that of moral truth. — David Mo
Kant's moral truth is of another order than empirical truth. — David Mo
But in the case of a plant, let us say, the inference from "is" to "needs" is certainly not in the least dubious. It is interesting and worth examining; but not at all fishy. Its interest is similar to the interest of the relation between brute and less brute facts: these relations have been very little considered. And while you can contrast "what it needs" with "what it's got"-like contrasting de facto and deiure-that does not make its needing this environment less of a "truth." "
Certainly in the case of what the plant needs, the thought of a need will only affect action if you want the plant to flourish. Here, then, there is no necessary connection between what you can judge the plant "needs" and what you want. But there is some sort of necessary connection between what you think you need, and what you want. The connection is a complicated one; it is possible not to want something that you judge you need. But, e.g., it is not possible never to want anything that you judge you need. This, however, is not a fact about the meaning of the word "to need," but about the phenomenon of wanting. Hume's reasoning, we might say, in effect, leads one to think it must be about the word "to need," or "to be good for."
Thus we find two problems already wrapped up in the remark about a transition from "is" to "ought"; now supposing that we had clarified the "relative bruteness" of facts on the one hand, and the notions involved in "needing," and "flourishing" on the other-there would still remain a third point. For, following Hume, someone might say: Perhaps you have made out your point about a transition from "is" This comment, it seems to me, would be correct. This word"ought," having become a word of mere mesmeric force, could not, in the character of having that force, be inferred from anything whatever. It may be objected that it could be inferred from other "morally ought" sentences: but that cannot be true. The appearance that this is so is produced by the fact that we say "All men are q" and "Socrates is a man" implies "Socrates is O." But here "O" is a dummy predicate. We mean that if you substitute a real predicate for "O" the implication is valid. A real predicate is required; not just a word containing no intelligible thought: a word retaining the suggestion of force, and apt to have a strong psychological effect, but which no longer signifies a real concept at all.
But meanwhile-is it not clear that there are several concepts that need investigating simply as part of the philosophy of psychology and,-as I should recommend-banishing ethics totally from our minds? Namely-to begin with: "action," "intention," "pleasure," "wanting." More will probably turn up if we start with these. Eventually it might be possible to advance to considering the concept "virtue"; with which, I suppose, we should be beginning some sort of a study of ethics.
Isn't it possible to have an ethical outlook that is not law-bound, and yet still hasa philosophical infrastructure?
Isn't that what virtue ethics is? — Banno
But "happiness" is just an arbitrary designation based in a principle of self-sufficiency, it's not properly supported. — Metaphysician Undercover
Allegorically, plants need water and sunlight because of what plants are. If moral philosophy was done by plants, maybe a Hume plant would have written that: "Whenever I have occasioned to find a treatise regarding our affairs, I have observed a transition from the usual copulations of propositions like "is a water requiring organism" and "does not survive without water" to "ought to absorb water " and "ought not station themselves in an arid landscape" which express a new affirmation of a different sort. Wherefrom this new type of affirmations are deduced from their precedents despite this difference in character I cannot conceive". — fdrake
But no one has ever troubled over deriving their wants... — unenlightened
The problem with virtue ethics is the appearance of infinite regress. — Metaphysician Undercover
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