18 ideas
| 5988 | Anaximander produced the first philosophy book (and maybe the first book) [Anaximander, by Bodnár] |
| Full Idea: Anaximander was the first to produce a philosophical book (later conventionally titled 'On Nature'), if not the first to produce a book at all. | |
| From: report of Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE]) by István Bodnár - Anaximander | |
| A reaction: Wow! Presumably there were Egyptian 'books', but this still sounds like a stupendous claim to fame. |
| 1496 | The earth is stationary, because it is in the centre, and has no more reason to move one way than another [Anaximander, by Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Something which is established in the centre and has equality in relation to the extremes has no more reason to move up than it has down or to the sides (so the earth is stationary) | |
| From: report of Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE], A26) by Aristotle - On the Heavens 295b11 |
| 5831 | The new view is that "water" is a name, and has no definition [Schwartz,SP] |
| Full Idea: Perhaps the modern view is best expressed as saying that "water" has no definition at all, at least in the traditional sense, and is a proper name of a specific substance. | |
| From: Stephen P. Schwartz (Intro to Naming,Necessity and Natural Kinds [1977], §III) | |
| A reaction: This assumes that proper names have no definitions, though I am not clear how we can grasp the name 'Aristotle' without some association of properties (human, for example) to go with it. We need a definition of 'definition'. |
| 5829 | We refer to Thales successfully by name, even if all descriptions of him are false [Schwartz,SP] |
| Full Idea: We can refer to Thales by using the name "Thales" even though perhaps the only description we can supply is false of him. | |
| From: Stephen P. Schwartz (Intro to Naming,Necessity and Natural Kinds [1977], §III) | |
| A reaction: It is not clear what we would be referring to if all of our descriptions (even 'Greek philosopher') were false. If an archaeologist finds just a scrap of stone with a name written on it, that is hardly a sufficient basis for successful reference. |
| 5830 | The traditional theory of names says some of the descriptions must be correct [Schwartz,SP] |
| Full Idea: The traditional theory of proper names entails that at least some combination of the things ordinarily believed of Aristotle are necessarily true of him. | |
| From: Stephen P. Schwartz (Intro to Naming,Necessity and Natural Kinds [1977], §III) | |
| A reaction: Searle endorses this traditional theory. Kripke and co. tried to dismiss it, but you can't. If all descriptions of Aristotle turned out to be false (it was actually the name of a Persian statue), our modern references would have been unsuccessful. |
| 14874 | Anaximander saw the contradiction in the world - that its own qualities destroy it [Anaximander, by Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Anaximander discovers the contradictory character of our world: it perishes from its own qualities. | |
| From: report of Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE]) by Friedrich Nietzsche - Unpublished Notebooks 1872-74 19 [239] | |
| A reaction: A lovely gloss on Anaximander, though I am not sure that I understand what Nietzsche means. |
| 17771 | How we evaluate evidence depends on our background beliefs [Bayne] |
| Full Idea: A claim that might be very plausible given one set of background beliefs might be highly implausible when evaluated in the light of a different set of background beliefs. | |
| From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.7) |
| 17770 | Clifford's dictum seems to block our beliefs in morality, politics and philosophy [Bayne] |
| Full Idea: Endorsing Clifford's dictum threatens to undermine our right to hold many of our most cherished beliefs about morality, politics, and philosophy, for these are domains in which it is notoriously difficult to secure consensus. | |
| From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.7) | |
| A reaction: I would say that those beliefs are amenable to evidence, but the evidence is often highly generalised, which is what makes those subjects notoriously difficult. The existence of a convention is a sort of evidence. |
| 17766 | Physicalism correlates brain and mind, explains causation by thought, and makes nature continuous [Bayne] |
| Full Idea: The motivations for physicalism about the mind are that it accounts for correlations between states of the brain and states of thought, ...that it accounts for the causal role of thoughts, ...and that it does justice to the continuity of nature. | |
| From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: [summary] That is a pretty good summary of why I am a physicalist about the mind. I take all other theories to be dead footnotes in the history of thought - unless someone can produce a really good new argument. Which they can't. |
| 17768 | Perception reveals what animals think, but humans can disengage thought from perception [Bayne] |
| Full Idea: One striking feature of human thought involves our ability to disengage the focus of thought from that of our perceptual attention. ...To get a fix on what an animal is thinking about, one need only determine the object of its perceptual attention. | |
| From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.4) | |
| A reaction: What happens when an animal closes its eyes, or stirs violently during sleep? I take the hallmark of human thought to be its multi-level character, and this offers nice evidence for that view. Doing philosophy while driving a car is very revealing. |
| 17769 | Some people centre space on themselves; others centre space on the earth [Bayne] |
| Full Idea: Egocentric conceptions of space employ a frame of reference that is focused on oneself; ...geocentric conceptions of space, by contrast, employ a frame of reference that is centred on the earth. | |
| From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.5) | |
| A reaction: Famously, Europeans nearly always employ the egocentric conception, but many other cultures are geocentric. Thus the salt cellar is either 'to my left' or 'to the west'. In the latter view, everyone always knows their orientation (even indoors?). |
| 17767 | The alternative to a language of thought is map-like or diagram-like thought [Bayne] |
| Full Idea: One could think that the structure of thought has more in common with that of maps or diagrams, and is not particularly language-like. | |
| From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: It seems unwise to be ensnared by analogies on this one, since the phenomenon is buried deep. You can no more infer what goes on underneath than you can infer electrons from looking at trees? |
| 5826 | The intension of "lemon" is the conjunction of properties associated with it [Schwartz,SP] |
| Full Idea: The conjunction of properties associated with a term such as "lemon" is often called the intension of the term "lemon". | |
| From: Stephen P. Schwartz (Intro to Naming,Necessity and Natural Kinds [1977], §II) | |
| A reaction: The extension of "lemon" is the set of all lemons. At last, a clear explanation of the word 'intension'! The debate becomes clear - over whether the terms of a language are used in reference to ideas of properties (and substances?), or to external items. |
| 405 | The essential nature, whatever it is, of the non-limited is everlasting and ageless [Anaximander] |
| Full Idea: The essential nature, whatever it is, of the non-limited is everlasting and ageless. | |
| From: Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE], B2), quoted by (who?) - where? |
| 13222 | The Boundless cannot exist on its own, and must have something contrary to it [Aristotle on Anaximander] |
| Full Idea: Those thinkers are in error who postulate ...a single matter, for this cannot exist without some 'perceptible contrariety': this Boundless, which they identify with the 'original real', must be either light or heavy, either hot or cold. | |
| From: comment on Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE]) by Aristotle - Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) 329a10 | |
| A reaction: A dubious objection, I would say. If there has to be a contrasting cold thing to any hot thing, what happens when the cold thing is removed? |
| 404 | Things begin and end in the Unlimited, and are balanced over time according to justice [Anaximander] |
| Full Idea: The non-limited is the original material of existing things; their source is also that to which they return after destruction, according to necessity; they give justice and make reparation to each other for injustice, according to the arrangement of Time. | |
| From: Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE], B1), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 24.13- | |
| A reaction: Simplicius is quoting Theophrastus |
| 1495 | Anaximander introduced the idea that the first principle and element of things was the Boundless [Anaximander, by Simplicius] |
| Full Idea: Anaximander said that the first principle and element of existing things was the boundless; it was he who originally introduced this name for the first principle. | |
| From: report of Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE], A09) by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.24.14- | |
| A reaction: Simplicius is quoting Theophrastus |
| 1746 | The parts of all things are susceptible to change, but the whole is unchangeable [Anaximander, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: The parts of all things are susceptible to change, but the whole is unchangeable. | |
| From: report of Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.An.2 |