display all the ideas for this combination of philosophers
2 ideas
| 4958 | Identities like 'heat is molecule motion' are necessary (in the highest degree), not contingent [Kripke] |
| Full Idea: I hold that characteristic theoretical identifications like 'heat is the motion of molecules', are not contingent truths but necessary truths, and I don't just mean physically necessary, but necessary in the highest degree. | |
| From: Saul A. Kripke (Naming and Necessity lectures [1970], Lecture 2) | |
| A reaction: This helps to keep epistemology and ontology separate. The contingency was in the epistemology. That the identity is 'physically necessary' seems obvious; that it is necessary 'in the highest degrees' implies an essentialist view of nature. |
| 20653 | Six reduction levels: groups, lives, cells, molecules, atoms, particles [Putnam/Oppenheim, by Watson] |
| Full Idea: There are six 'reductive levels' in science: social groups, (multicellular) living things, cells, molecules, atoms, and elementary particles. | |
| From: report of H.Putnam/P.Oppenheim (Unity of Science as a Working Hypothesis [1958]) by Peter Watson - Convergence 10 'Intro' | |
| A reaction: I have the impression that fields are seen as more fundamental that elementary particles. What is the status of the 'laws' that are supposed to govern these things? What is the status of space and time within this picture? |