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Suggestions for posts are greatly appreciated. If you’ve come across something that you think would suit this site, please post it below or use the message form on the About page.
Thanks,
Chris.
Comments
11 Comments so far
Suggestions for posts are greatly appreciated. If you’ve come across something that you think would suit this site, please post it below or use the message form on the About page.
Thanks,
Chris.
11 Comments so far
Well, obviously there’s Descartes and his thoughts on the role of the pineal gland (as the interface between the soul and the body or something).
This one would go well with your Rousseau posts: Mandeville wrote in his Defense of Public Stews (1724), that it’s better that boys visit brothels than that they commit “rapes upon their own bodies.”
And there’s a lot more dirt on Kant in the Soble article that you link to, but I guess you know that.
Heidegger thought that the Greek and German languages were intrinsically better-suited to doing philosophy than others, because of the ‘inner strength and greatness’ of the people who spoke them. (The Essence of Human Freedom)
Locke relates a story about a talking (and thinking) parakeet as if credible.
G.E. Moore thought that oranges were both yellow and sweet! (Principia Ethica)
Schopenhauer strangely thought reading too much ruined ones ability to think for oneself. See ‘On reading and books’ in the Hollingdale collection.
Aristotle thought that males were conceived in a strong north wind.
That champion of reason and freedom, Voltaire, thought that dogs were not one species but a number of species that we mistakenly call one (his underlying reasoning actually wasn’t that bad: he thought they were too varied to be all of one species). You will have to read his excellent ‘Philosophical Dictionary’ for the exact comments on that matter, however (I can’t remember where specifically).
Alvin Plantinga thinks (or thought?) that fallen angels cause earthquakes and other natural disasters. Google will provide you the appropriate source material references, I am sure. (although since he is contemporary, I don’t know whether he fits in with the theme of the website).
On the Eastern philosophy front:
D.T. Suzuki – the famous and celebrated Japanese Soto Zen Buddhist who practically introduced Zen to the West – was a war supporter who provided absurd justifications for the Japanese invasion of Korea and China.
I view him as the Japanese version of Heidegger. He was a war sympathizer who dressed up militarism with some suspect Buddhist philosophizing. Unlike Heidegger, he was never pulled up on his militarism or his supply of Imperialist propoganda.
If you’re interested I can submit a short article myself or provide the details of his position for you to sort out. His militarism is detailed in his book “The New Meaning of Religion”. The best secondary source is “Zen at War” by Brian Victoria.
I intend to write a lengthy article on this for my own blog, but you should have it too.
Kind regards,
James
[note: an article has since been posted, viewable here
Thanks for the suggestions. I’ll definitely follow them up. I already have Heidegger’s little Nazi adventure on the to-do list, so Suzuki will make an interesting counterpoint (and, for me, it’s a local topic and ‘Zen at War’ is already on my reading list).
The Voltaire topic sounds good for a laugh.
As for Plantinga, ugh. Haven’t read much except his review of the God Delusion , but for a professional philosopher it’s a disgrace (replace ‘evolution = chance’ with ‘evolution = unguided process’ and stick head back into sand). Still, I’ll try to find out where the fallen angels are at. I’m guessing there’s a few here in Japan, given the instablility of the ground …
After many comments on Heidegger’s “nazi adventure” why don’t you check out Frege’s similar wiews? there are still many sources on the web, even some of them removed(for example from wikipedia).
some tracks
http://www.friesian.com/fries.htm
http://www.axt.org.uk/essays/sacks1.htm
and there is a funny one: a homework set, for dutch logicians.:)
http://staff.science.uva.nl/~bloewe/2006-07-I/2006-CL-E9.pdf
kind regards,
kristof
Hi Chris,
First, thank you for this fascinating site. From time to time I enjoy popping by to see what new discoveries you have made. Some of the comments posted are also good for a laugh.
Second, I have a few other suggestions that you might want to look into:
(1) Descartes had the famous view that animals were clockworks that feel no pain whatsoever. His Cartesian view motivated a whole movement of live vivesection. They all believed that the wails made by the animals were just “noises” produced by excess poking, just as a clock may make noises when one messes with its internal mechanism. I believe this is all outlined in his “Discourse on Method.” Obviously this view is horribly wrong and dangerous (for the animal naturally).
(2) Have you looked into Sartre? I believe that he has few good things to say about homosexuality. If I recall correctly, there is evidence in his “Being and Nothingness” that suggests that he views homosexuals as being de facto ‘inauthentic.’
Please keep up the excellent work. I am also looking forward to your forthcoming book on Satanism.
Kind regards
James
How about in The Laws, where Plato determines that the ideal number of citizens for a state is 5040. This is obvious since it can be “divided by exactly fifty-nine divisors.”
Maybe C.I. Lewis isn’t famous enough to make an infamous error, but the following (from his _Analysis of Knowledge and Valuation_) always struck me as a terrible philosophical mistake:
“If anything is to be probable, then something must be certain. The data which support a genuine probability must themselves be certainties.”
I will only suggest that the black color as background is “pretty” but not good for the reading. I would preffer a more simple design in white.
Thank you.