31 ideas
3859 | We do not wish merely to predict, we also want to explain [Newton-Smith] |
3870 | The real problem of science is how to choose between possible explanations [Newton-Smith] |
3853 | For science to be rational, we must explain scientific change rationally [Newton-Smith] |
3855 | Critics attack positivist division between theory and observation [Newton-Smith] |
3854 | Positivists hold that theoretical terms change, but observation terms don't [Newton-Smith] |
3869 | More truthful theories have greater predictive power [Newton-Smith] |
3861 | Theories generate infinite truths and falsehoods, so they cannot be used to assess probability [Newton-Smith] |
14329 | Some dispositional properties (such as mental ones) may have no categorical base [Price,HH] |
3867 | De re necessity arises from the way the world is [Newton-Smith] |
3872 | We must assess the truth of beliefs in identifying them [Newton-Smith] |
3061 | Anaxarchus said that he was not even sure that he knew nothing [Anaxarchus, by Diog. Laertius] |
3857 | Defeat relativism by emphasising truth and reference, not meaning [Newton-Smith] |
3858 | A full understanding of 'yellow' involves some theory [Newton-Smith] |
3862 | All theories contain anomalies, and so are falsified! [Newton-Smith] |
3863 | The anomaly of Uranus didn't destroy Newton's mechanics - it led to Neptune's discovery [Newton-Smith] |
3864 | Anomalies are judged against rival theories, and support for the current theory [Newton-Smith] |
3865 | Why should it matter whether or not a theory is scientific? [Newton-Smith] |
3866 | If theories are really incommensurable, we could believe them all [Newton-Smith] |
9032 | Before we can abstract from an instance of violet, we must first recognise it [Price,HH] |
9035 | If judgement of a characteristic is possible, that part of abstraction must be complete [Price,HH] |
9034 | There may be degrees of abstraction which allow recognition by signs, without full concepts [Price,HH] |
9036 | There is pre-verbal sign-based abstraction, as when ice actually looks cold [Price,HH] |
9037 | Intelligent behaviour, even in animals, has something abstract about it [Price,HH] |
9033 | Recognition must precede the acquisition of basic concepts, so it is the fundamental intellectual process [Price,HH] |
10645 | We reach concepts by clarification, or by definition, or by habitual experience [Price,HH] |
9030 | Abstractions can be interpreted dispositionally, as the ability to recognise or imagine an item [Price,HH] |
9029 | If ideas have to be images, then abstract ideas become a paradoxical problem [Price,HH] |
10644 | A 'felt familiarity' with universals is more primitive than abstraction [Price,HH] |
10646 | Our understanding of 'dog' or 'house' arises from a repeated experience of concomitances [Price,HH] |
9031 | The basic concepts of conceptual cognition are acquired by direct abstraction from instances [Price,HH] |
3871 | Explaining an action is showing that it is rational [Newton-Smith] |