display all the ideas for this combination of philosophers
2 ideas
| 14435 | The essence of individuality is beyond description, and hence irrelevant to science [Russell] |
| Full Idea: The essence of individuality always eludes words and baffles description, and is for that very reason irrelevant to science. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy [1919], VI) | |
| A reaction: [context needed for a full grasp of this idea] Russell seems to refer to essence as much as to individuality. The modern essentialist view is that essences are not beyond description after all. Fundamental physics is clearer now than in 1919. |
| 14170 | Change is obscured by substance, a thing's nature, subject-predicate form, and by essences [Russell] |
| Full Idea: The notion of change is obscured by the doctrine of substance, by a thing's nature versus its external relations, and by subject-predicate form, so that things can be different and the same. Hence the useless distinction between essential and accidental. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (The Principles of Mathematics [1903], §443) | |
| A reaction: He goes on to object to vague unconscious usage of 'essence' by modern thinkers, but allows (teasingly) that medieval thinkers may have been precise about it. It is a fact, in common life, that things can change and be the same. Explain it! |