8525
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Relations need terms, so they must be second-order entities based on first-order tropes [Campbell,K]
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Full Idea:
Because there cannot be relations without terms, in a meta-physic that makes first-order tropes the terms of all relations, relational tropes must belong to a second, derivative order.
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From:
Keith Campbell (The Metaphysic of Abstract Particulars [1981], §8)
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A reaction:
The admission that there could be a 'derivative order' may lead to trouble for trope theory. Ostrich Nominalists could say that properties themselves are derivative second-order abstractions from indivisible particulars. Russell makes them first-order.
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8513
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Two red cloths are separate instances of redness, because you can dye one of them blue [Campbell,K]
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Full Idea:
If we have two cloths of the very same shade of redness, we can show there are two cloths by burning one and leaving the other unaffected; we show there are two cases of redness in the same way: dye one blue, leaving the other unaffected.
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From:
Keith Campbell (The Metaphysic of Abstract Particulars [1981], §1)
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A reaction:
This has to be one of the basic facts of the problem accepted by everyone. If you dye half of one of the pieces, was the original red therefore one instance or two? Has it become two? How many red tropes are there in a red cloth?
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8524
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Trope theory makes space central to reality, as tropes must have a shape and size [Campbell,K]
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Full Idea:
The metaphysics of abstract particulars gives a central place to space, or space-time, as the frame of the world. ...Tropes are, of their essence, regional, which carries with it the essential presence of shape and size in any trope occurrence.
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From:
Keith Campbell (The Metaphysic of Abstract Particulars [1981], §7)
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A reaction:
Trope theory has a problem with Aristotle's example (Idea 557) of what happens when white is mixed with white. Do two tropes become one trope if you paint on a second coat of white? How can particulars merge? How can abstractions merge?
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8519
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Bundles must be unique, so the Identity of Indiscernibles is a necessity - which it isn't! [Campbell,K]
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Full Idea:
Each individual is distinct from each other individual, so the bundle account of objects requires each bundle to be different from every other bundle. So the Identity of Indiscernibles must be a necessary truth, which, unfortunately, it is not.
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From:
Keith Campbell (The Metaphysic of Abstract Particulars [1981], §5)
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A reaction:
Clearly the Identity of Indiscernibles is not a necessary truth (consider just two identical spheres). Location and time must enter into it. Could we not add a further individuation requirement to the necessary existence of a bundle? (Quinton)
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8512
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Abstractions come before the mind by concentrating on a part of what is presented [Campbell,K]
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Full Idea:
An item is abstract if it is got before the mind by an act of abstraction, that is, by concentrating attention on some, but not all, of what is presented.
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From:
Keith Campbell (The Metaphysic of Abstract Particulars [1981], §1)
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A reaction:
I think this point is incredibly important. Pure Fregean semantics tries to leave out the psychological component, and yet all the problems in semantics concern various sorts of abstraction. Imagination is the focus of the whole operation.
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2854
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Prescriptivism says 'ought' without commitment to act is insincere, or weakly used [Hooker,B]
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Full Idea:
Prescriptivism holds that if you think one 'ought' to do a certain kind of act, and yet you are not committed to doing that act in the relevant circumstances, then you either spoke insincerely, or are using the word 'ought' in a weak sense.
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From:
Brad W. Hooker (Prescriptivism [1995], p.640)
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A reaction:
So that's an 'ought', but not a 'genuine ought', then? (No True Scotsman move). Someone ought to rescue that drowning child, but I can't be bothered.
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20883
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Modern utilitarians value knowledge, friendship, autonomy, and achievement, as well as pleasure [Hooker,B]
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Full Idea:
Most utilitarians now think that pleasure, even if construed widely, is not the only thing desirable in itself. ...Goods also include important knowledge, friendship, autonomy, achievement and so on.
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From:
Brad W. Hooker (Rule Utilitarianism and Euthanasia [1997], 2)
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A reaction:
That pleasure is desired is empirically verifiable, which certainly motivated Bentham. A string of other desirables each needs to be justified - but how? What would be the value of a 'friendship' if neither party got pleasure from it?
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20751
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As a young girl assumes her status as feminine, she acts in a more fragile immobile way [Young,IM]
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Full Idea:
The young girl acquires many subject habits of feminine body comportment - walking, tilting her head, standing and sitting like a girl, and so on ….The more a girl assumes her status as feminine, the more she takes herself to be fragile and immobile.
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From:
Iris Marion Young (On Female Body Experience [2005], p.43), quoted by Kevin Aho - Existentialism: an introduction 3 'Aspects'
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A reaction:
This strikes me as true of young women, but it largely wears off as they get older, at least among modern women. A whole book could be written about women and smiling.
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20885
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Euthanasia is active or passive, and voluntary, non-voluntary or involuntary [Hooker,B]
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Full Idea:
Six types of euthanasia: 1) Active voluntary (knowing my wishes), 2) Active non-voluntary (not knowing my wishes), 3) Active involuntary (against my wishes), 4) Passive voluntary, 5) Passive non-voluntary, 6) Passive involuntary.
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From:
Brad W. Hooker (Rule Utilitarianism and Euthanasia [1997], 5)
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A reaction:
'Active' is intervening, and 'passive' is not intervening. A helpful framework.
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20882
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Euthanasia may not involve killing, so it is 'killing or not saving, out of concern for that person' [Hooker,B]
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Full Idea:
Passive euthanasia is arguably not killing, and the death involved is often painful, so let us take the term 'euthanasia' to mean 'either killing or passing up opportunities to save someone, out of concern for that person'.
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From:
Brad W. Hooker (Rule Utilitarianism and Euthanasia [1997], 1)
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A reaction:
This sounds good, and easily settled, until you think concern for that person could have two different outcomes, depending on whether the criteria are those of the decider or of the patient. Think of religious decider and atheist patient, or vice versa.
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8516
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Davidson can't explain causation entirely by events, because conditions are also involved [Campbell,K]
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Full Idea:
Not all singular causal statements are of Davidson's event-event type. Many involve conditions, so there are condition-event (weakness/collapse), event-condition (explosion/movement), and condition-condition (hot/warming) causal connections.
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From:
Keith Campbell (The Metaphysic of Abstract Particulars [1981], §3)
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A reaction:
Fans of Davidson need to reduce conditions to events. The problem of individuation keeps raising its head. Davidson makes it depend on description. Kim looks good, because events, and presumably conditions, reduce to something small and precise.
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