Combining Philosophers

All the ideas for Brand Blanshard, Leopold Kronecker and Ramon

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6 ideas

2. Reason / A. Nature of Reason / 6. Coherence
2764 Full coherence might involve consistency and mutual entailment of all propositions [Blanshard, by Dancy,J]
     Full Idea: Blanshard says that in a fully coherent system there would not only be consistency, but every proposition would be entailed by the others, and no proposition would stand outside the system.
     From: report of Brand Blanshard (The Nature of Thought [1939], 2:265) by Jonathan Dancy - Intro to Contemporary Epistemology 8.1
     A reaction: Hm. If a proposition is entailed by the others, then it is a necessary truth (given the others) which sounds deterministic. You could predict all the truths you had never encountered. See 1578:178 for quote.
3. Truth / D. Coherence Truth / 1. Coherence Truth
19080 Coherence tests for truth without implying correspondence, so truth is not correspondence [Blanshard, by Young,JO]
     Full Idea: Blanshard said that coherent justification leads to coherence truth. It might be said that coherence is a test for truth, but truth is correspondence. But coherence doesn't guarantee correspondence, and coherence is a test, so truth is not correspondence.
     From: report of Brand Blanshard (The Nature of Thought [1939], Ch.26) by James O. Young - The Coherence Theory of Truth §2.2
     A reaction: [compression of Young's summary] Rescher (1973) says that Blanshard's argument depends on coherence being an infallible test for truth, which it isn't.
5. Theory of Logic / A. Overview of Logic / 2. History of Logic
19369 Lull's combinatorial art would articulate all the basic concepts, then show how they combine [Lull, by Arthur,R]
     Full Idea: Lull proposed a combinatorial art. He wanted to reconcile Islam and Christianity by articulating the basic concepts that their belief systems held in common, and then inventing a device that would allow these concepts to be combined.
     From: report of Ramon (Ars Magna [1305]) by Richard T.W. Arthur - Leibniz 2 Intro
     A reaction: Leibniz's Universal Characteristic was an attempt at continuing Lull's project. Lull's plan rested on Aristotle's categories.
6. Mathematics / A. Nature of Mathematics / 1. Mathematics
12427 All of mathematics is properties of the whole numbers [Kronecker]
     Full Idea: All the results of significant mathematical research must ultimately be expressible in the simple forms of properties of whole numbers.
     From: Leopold Kronecker (works [1885], Vol 3/274), quoted by Philip Kitcher - The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge 09.5
     A reaction: I've always liked Kronecker's line, but I'm beginning to realise that his use of the word 'number' is simply out-of-date. Natural numbers have a special status, but not sufficient to support this claim.
6. Mathematics / A. Nature of Mathematics / 3. Nature of Numbers / c. Priority of numbers
10091 God made the integers, all the rest is the work of man [Kronecker]
     Full Idea: God made the integers, all the rest is the work of man.
     From: Leopold Kronecker (works [1885]), quoted by A.George / D.J.Velleman - Philosophies of Mathematics Intro
     A reaction: This famous remark was first quoted in Kronecker's obituary. A response to Dedekind, it seems. See Idea 10090. Did he really mean that negative numbers were the work of God? We took a long time to spot them.
28. God / A. Divine Nature / 3. Divine Perfections
19371 Nine principles of God: goodness, greatness, eternity, power, wisdom, will, virtue, truth and glory [Lull, by Arthur,R]
     Full Idea: Lull restricted himself to only nine 'absolute principles' of God: goodness, greatness, eternity, power, wisdom, will, virtue, truth and glory
     From: report of Ramon (Ars Magna [1305]) by Richard T.W. Arthur - Leibniz 2 'Combinatorics'
     A reaction: Leibniz responded that God's perfections are infinite in number, and thus beyond human comprehension. Lull cut them down to nine, because he was designing a sort of conceptual logic that employed them.