[lit-ideas] Re: Donalling Donal
- From: Robert.Paul@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Robert Paul)
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: 09 Oct 2004 11:46:36 PDT
>By 'little list', I think R. Paul's reference is to the Japanese operetta by
Gilbert and Sullivan.<
It is, in fact, a British operetta with a 'Japanese' setting. But my actual
reference via these borrowed words, was to Donal's 'list' of Oxford philosophers
who have made the worse appear the better, corrupted the youth, etc.
>Why circular?<
Much for the reasons JL gives:
Why does Alice avoid philosophers?
Because she has a disposition to avoid philosophers.
What's the evidence that she has this disposition?
She avoids philosophers.
Au fond, as we say in Canada, to say that someone has a disposition to do x is
just to say that he does x. It's said that fragility is a 'dispositional
property' because fragile things have a disposition to break under certain
circumstances. This doesn't explain _why_ things break beyond saying that
they're fragile, and it violates Occam's maxim.
'It broke because it was fragile,' is no more an explanation of why it broke
than 'It broke because it was its nature to break,' would be. 'It broke because
it had a disposition to break' is worse yet.
Robert Paul
Reed College
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