Combining Philosophers

Ideas for Lynch,MP/Glasgow,JM, Nancy Cartwright and Robert Pasnau

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4 ideas

7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 1. Grounding / a. Nature of grounding
Priority was a major topic of dispute for scholastics [Pasnau]
     Full Idea: For a scholastic author, hardly anything was so likely to precipitate a lengthy disputatio as talk of priority, in its various kinds.
     From: Robert Pasnau (Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 [2011], 04.3)
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 3. Levels of Reality
A necessary relation between fact-levels seems to be a further irreducible fact [Lynch/Glasgow]
     Full Idea: It seems unavoidable that the facts about logically necessary relations between levels of facts are themselves logically distinct further facts, irreducible to the microphysical facts.
     From: Lynch,MP/Glasgow,JM (The Impossibility of Superdupervenience [2003], C)
     A reaction: I'm beginning to think that rejecting every theory of reality that is proposed by carefully exposing some infinite regress hidden in it is a rather lazy way to do philosophy. Almost as bad as rejecting anything if it can't be defined.
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 5. Supervenience / c. Significance of supervenience
If some facts 'logically supervene' on some others, they just redescribe them, adding nothing [Lynch/Glasgow]
     Full Idea: Logical supervenience, restricted to individuals, seems to imply strong reduction. It is said that where the B-facts logically supervene on the A-facts, the B-facts simply re-describe what the A-facts describe, and the B-facts come along 'for free'.
     From: Lynch,MP/Glasgow,JM (The Impossibility of Superdupervenience [2003], C)
     A reaction: This seems to be taking 'logically' to mean 'analytically'. Presumably an entailment is logically supervenient on its premisses, and may therefore be very revealing, even if some people think such things are analytic.
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 8. Stuff / b. Mixtures
In mixtures, the four elements ceased to exist, replaced by a mixed body with a form [Pasnau]
     Full Idea: The standard view was that in a mixture there is only the mixed body and its substantial form (gold). There are no further substantial forms of the elements, because the elements do not actually exist within the body.
     From: Robert Pasnau (Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 [2011], 22.3)
     A reaction: This seems to me to be the key idea that was overthrown in the seventeenth century, so that corpuscular matter kept aspects of its ingredients, which science could then investigate. With the substantial form, investigation seemed impossible.