16 ideas
22361 | Contextual values are acceptable in research, but not in its final evaluation [Reichenbach, by Reiss/Sprenger] |
Full Idea: Reichenbach's claim is interpreted as saying that contextual values, which may have contributed to the discovery of a theory, are irrelevant for justifying the acceptance of a theory, and for assessing how evidence bears on theory. | |
From: report of Hans Reichenbach (On Probability and Induction [1938], pp.36-7) by Reiss,J/Spreger,J - Scientific Objectivity 3.2 | |
A reaction: This influential idea is very helpful. It allows Galileo and co to pursus all sorts of highly personal and quirky lines of enquiry, because we only demand full objectivity when it is all over. Very good! |
8964 | Entities can be multiplied either by excessive categories, or excessive entities within a category [Hoffman/Rosenkrantz] |
Full Idea: There are two ways that entities can be multiplied unnecessarily: by multiplying the number of explanatory categories, and by multiplying the number of entities within a category. | |
From: J Hoffman/G Rosenkrantz (Platonistic Theories of Universals [2003], 4) | |
A reaction: An important distinction. The orthodox view is that it is the excess of categories that is to be avoided (e.g. by nominalists). Possible worlds in metaphysics, and multiple worlds in physics, claim not to violate the first case. |
10397 | Abelard's mereology involves privileged and natural divisions, and principal parts [Abelard, by King,P] |
Full Idea: Abelard's theory of substantial integral wholes is not a pure mereology in the modern sense, since he holds that there are privileged divisions; ..the division of a whole must be into its principal parts. Some wholes have a natural division. | |
From: report of Peter Abelard (works [1135]) by Peter King - Peter Abelard 2 | |
A reaction: This is a mereology that cuts nature at the joints, rather than Lewis's 'unrestricted composition', so I find Abelard rather appealing. |
8962 | 'There are shapes which are never exemplified' is the toughest example for nominalists [Hoffman/Rosenkrantz] |
Full Idea: The example which presents the most serious challenge to nominalism is 'there are shapes which are never exemplified'. | |
From: J Hoffman/G Rosenkrantz (Platonistic Theories of Universals [2003], 3) | |
A reaction: To 'exemplify' a shape must it be a physical object, or a drawing of such an object, or a description? If none of those have ever existed, I'm not sure what 'are' is supposed to mean. They seem to be possibilia (with all the associated problems). |
8961 | Nominalists are motivated by Ockham's Razor and a distrust of unobservables [Hoffman/Rosenkrantz] |
Full Idea: The two main motivations for nominalism are an admirable commitment to Ockham's Razor, and a queasiness about postulating entities that are unobservable or non-empirical, existing in a non-physical realm. | |
From: J Hoffman/G Rosenkrantz (Platonistic Theories of Universals [2003], 3) | |
A reaction: It doesn't follow that because the entities are unobservable that they are non-physical. Consider the 'interior' of an electron. Neverless I share a love of Ockham's Razor and a deep caution about unobservables. |
10396 | If 'animal' is wholly present in Socrates and an ass, then 'animal' is rational and irrational [Abelard, by King,P] |
Full Idea: Abelard argued that if the universal 'animal' were completely present in both Socrates and an ass, making each wholly an animal, then the same thing, animal, will be simultaneously rational and irrational, with contraries present in the whole thing. | |
From: report of Peter Abelard (works [1135]) by Peter King - Peter Abelard 2 | |
A reaction: If we have universals for rationality and irrationality, they can distinguish the two. But we must also say that rationality is not an aspect of animal, which seems to mean that mind isn't either. What is the essence of an animal? Not reason? |
10395 | Abelard was an irrealist about virtually everything apart from concrete individuals [Abelard, by King,P] |
Full Idea: Abelard was an irrealist about universals, but also about propositions, events, times other than the present, natural kinds, relations, wholes, absolute space, hylomorphic composites, and the like. The concrete individual is enough to populate the world. | |
From: report of Peter Abelard (works [1135]) by Peter King - Peter Abelard 2 | |
A reaction: If a Nominalist claims that 'only particulars exist', this makes him an extreme nominalist, and remarkably materialistic for his time (though he accepted the soul, as well as God). |
15384 | Only words can be 'predicated of many'; the universality is just in its mode of signifying [Abelard, by Panaccio] |
Full Idea: Abelard concluded that only words can be 'predicated of many'. A universal is nothing but a general linguistic predicate, and its universality depends not on its mode of being, but on its mode of signifying. | |
From: report of Peter Abelard (works [1135]) by Claude Panaccio - Medieval Problem of Universals 'Peter' | |
A reaction: Abelard seems to be the originator of what is now called Predicate Nominalism, with Nelson Goodman as his modern representative. If it is just words, is there no fact of two things having the 'same' property? |
8481 | The de dicto-de re modality distinction dates back to Abelard [Abelard, by Orenstein] |
Full Idea: The de dicto-de re modality distinction dates back to Abelard. | |
From: report of Peter Abelard (works [1135]) by Alex Orenstein - W.V. Quine Ch.7 | |
A reaction: Most modern philosophers couldn't (apparently) care less where a concept originated, but one of the principles of this database is that such things do matter. I'm not sure why, but if we want the whole picture, we need the historical picture. |
8963 | Four theories of possible worlds: conceptualist, combinatorial, abstract, or concrete [Hoffman/Rosenkrantz] |
Full Idea: There are four models of the ontological status of possible worlds: conceptualist (mental constructions), combinatorial (all combinations of the actual world), abstract worlds (conjunction of propositions), and concrete worlds (collections of concreta). | |
From: J Hoffman/G Rosenkrantz (Platonistic Theories of Universals [2003], 4) | |
A reaction: [the proponents cited are, in order, Rescher, Cresswell, Plantinga and Lewis] They dismiss Rescher and Cresswell, both of whom seem to me more plausible than Plantinga or Lewis. 'Possible' can't figure in the definition. Possible to us, or in reality? |
18278 | Kant showed that our perceptions are partly constructed from our concepts [Reichenbach] |
Full Idea: It was Kant's great discovery that the object of knowledge is not simply given but constructed, and that it contains conceptual elements not contained in pure perception. | |
From: Hans Reichenbach (The Theory of Relativity and A Priori Knowledge [1965], p.49), quoted by J. Alberto Coffa - The Semantic Tradition from Kant to Carnap |
15385 | Abelard's problem is the purely singular aspects of things won't account for abstraction [Panaccio on Abelard] |
Full Idea: Abelard's problem is that it is not clear how singular forms could do the job they are supposed to do - to account for abstraction, namely - if they were purely singular aspects. | |
From: comment on Peter Abelard (works [1135]) by Claude Panaccio - Medieval Problem of Universals 'Peter' | |
A reaction: A very nice question! If we say that abstracta are just acquired by ignoring all but that feature in some objects, how do we identify 'that' feature in order to select it? The instances must share something in common to be abstracted. |
15383 | Nothing external can truly be predicated of an object [Abelard, by Panaccio] |
Full Idea: Abelard argued from the commonly accepted definition of a universal as 'what can be predicated of man', that no external thing can ever be predicated of anything. | |
From: report of Peter Abelard (works [1135]) by Claude Panaccio - Medieval Problem of Universals 'Peter' | |
A reaction: It sounds to me as if Abelard is confusing predicates with properties! Maybe no external can be a property of anything, but I take predicates to just be part of what you can say about anything, and that had better included external facts. |
10398 | Natural kinds are not special; they are just well-defined resemblance collections [Abelard, by King,P] |
Full Idea: In Abelard's view a natural kind is a well-defined collection of things that have the same features, so that natural kinds have no special status, being no more than discrete integral wholes whose principle of membership is similarity. | |
From: report of Peter Abelard (works [1135]) by Peter King - Peter Abelard 2 | |
A reaction: I take a natural kind to be a completely stable and invariant class of things. Presumably this invariance has an underlying explanation, but Abelard seems to take the Humean line that we cannot penetrate beyond the experienced surface. |
8410 | A theory of causal relations yields an asymmetry which defines the direction of time [Reichenbach, by Salmon] |
Full Idea: Reichenbach wanted to implement a causal theory of time. He did not stipulate that causes are temporally prior to their effects. Instead, he constructs a theory of causal relations to yield a causal asymmetry which is used to define temporal priority. | |
From: report of Hans Reichenbach (The Direction of Time [1956]) by Wesley Salmon - Probabilistic Causality | |
A reaction: I find his approach implausible. I suspect strong empiricism is behind it - that he wants to build from observable causes to unobservable time, not vice versa. But normal intuition sees time as one of the bedrocks of reality, making events possible. |
14935 | The direction of time is grounded in the direction of causation [Reichenbach, by Ladyman/Ross] |
Full Idea: Reichenbach argued that temporal asymmetry is grounded in causal asymmetry. | |
From: report of Hans Reichenbach (The Direction of Time [1956]) by J Ladyman / D Ross - Every Thing Must Go | |
A reaction: I'm not sure that I can make sense of giving priority either to time or to causation when it comes to this asymmetry. How do you decide which one is boss? |