Combining Philosophers

All the ideas for Anaxarchus, Blasius of Parma and Robert B. Brandom

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     specify just one area for these philosophers

---

4 ideas

3. Truth / C. Correspondence Truth / 2. Correspondence to Facts

10355	Facts can't make claims true, because they are true claims [Brandom, by Kusch]
	Full Idea: Brandom says that facts do not make claims true, because facts simply are true claims.
	From: report of Robert B. Brandom (Making It Explicit [1994], p.327) by Martin Kusch - Knowledge by Agreement Ch.18
	A reaction: Nice. Notoriously, anyone defending the correspondence theory of truth in terms of facts had better say what they mean by a 'fact'. Personally I take a fact to be a non-verbal, mind-independent situation in the world, so I disagree with Brandom.

13. Knowledge Criteria / D. Scepticism / 1. Scepticism

3061	Anaxarchus said that he was not even sure that he knew nothing [Anaxarchus, by Diog. Laertius]
	Full Idea: Anaxarchus said that he was not even sure that he knew nothing.
	From: report of Anaxarchus (fragments/reports [c.340 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.10.1

17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 1. Physical Mind

16618	Intellectual and moral states, and even the soul itself, depend on prime matter for their existence [Blasius, by Pasnau]
	Full Idea: Blasius argued that prime matter is the subject of all our intellectual and moral states. This implies that such states cannot exist apart from the body, which seems to imply further that the soul itself cannot exist apart from the body.
	From: report of Blasius of Parma (Les quaestiones de anima (lectures on the soul) [1385], I.8 p.65) by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 06.3
	A reaction: It seems that, under pressure, Blasius recanted this view in lectures given eleven years later.

19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 6. Meaning as Use

7765	The use of a sentence is its commitments and entitlements [Brandom, by Lycan]
	Full Idea: Brandom develops a particular conception of 'use', according to which a sentence's use is the set of commitments and entitlements associated with public utterance of that sentence.
	From: report of Robert B. Brandom (Articulating Reasons: Intro to Inferentialism [2000]) by William Lycan - Philosophy of Language Ch.6
	A reaction: It immediately strikes me that a sentence could only have commitments and entitlements if it already had a meaning. However, the case of money shows how there might be nothing more to a thing's significance than its entitlements.