107 ideas
16841 | Good inference has mechanism, precision, scope, simplicity, fertility and background fit [Lipton] |
16854 | Contrary pairs entail contradictions; one member entails negation of the other [Lipton] |
3035 | Dialectic involves conversations with short questions and brief answers [Diog. Laertius] |
14650 | Maybe proper names involve essentialism [Plantinga] |
14648 | Could I name all of the real numbers in one fell swoop? Call them all 'Charley'? [Plantinga] |
14664 | Necessary beings (numbers, properties, sets, propositions, states of affairs, God) exist in all possible worlds [Plantinga] |
16435 | Plantinga proposes necessary existent essences as surrogates for the nonexistent things [Plantinga, by Stalnaker] |
14655 | The 'identity criteria' of a name are a group of essential and established facts [Plantinga] |
14647 | Surely self-identity is essential to Socrates? [Plantinga] |
14658 | 'Being Socrates' and 'being identical with Socrates' characterise Socrates, so they are among his properties [Plantinga] |
13132 | A snowball's haecceity is the property of being identical with itself [Plantinga, by Westerhoff] |
14666 | Socrates is a contingent being, but his essence is not; without Socrates, his essence is unexemplified [Plantinga] |
14656 | Does Socrates have essential properties, plus a unique essence (or 'haecceity') which entails them? [Plantinga] |
14646 | An object has a property essentially if it couldn't conceivably have lacked it [Plantinga] |
14654 | Properties are 'trivially essential' if they are instantiated by every object in every possible world [Plantinga] |
14653 | X is essentially P if it is P in every world, or in every X-world, or in the actual world (and not ¬P elsewhere) [Plantinga] |
14660 | If a property is ever essential, can it only ever be an essential property? [Plantinga] |
14661 | Essences are instantiated, and are what entails a thing's properties and lack of properties [Plantinga] |
14657 | Does 'being identical with Socrates' name a property? I can think of no objections to it [Plantinga] |
14642 | Expressing modality about a statement is 'de dicto'; expressing it of property-possession is 'de re' [Plantinga] |
14643 | 'De dicto' true and 'de re' false is possible, and so is 'de dicto' false and 'de re' true [Plantinga] |
14649 | Can we find an appropriate 'de dicto' paraphrase for any 'de re' proposition? [Plantinga] |
14652 | 'De re' modality is as clear as 'de dicto' modality, because they are logically equivalent [Plantinga] |
14659 | We can imagine being beetles or alligators, so it is possible we might have such bodies [Plantinga] |
11984 | Asserting a possible property is to say it would have had the property if that world had been actual [Plantinga] |
14662 | Possible worlds clarify possibility, propositions, properties, sets, counterfacts, time, determinism etc. [Plantinga] |
18383 | Plantinga says there is just this world, with possibilities expressed in propositions [Plantinga, by Armstrong] |
16472 | Plantinga's actualism is nominal, because he fills actuality with possibilia [Stalnaker on Plantinga] |
11980 | A possible world is a maximal possible state of affairs [Plantinga] |
14651 | What Socrates could have been, and could have become, are different? [Plantinga] |
11982 | If possible Socrates differs from actual Socrates, the Indiscernibility of Identicals says they are different [Plantinga] |
11983 | It doesn't matter that we can't identify the possible Socrates; we can't identify adults from baby photos [Plantinga] |
11985 | If individuals can only exist in one world, then they can never lack any of their properties [Plantinga] |
11891 | Possibilities for an individual can only refer to that individual, in some possible world [Plantinga, by Mackie,P] |
11986 | The counterparts of Socrates have self-identity, but only the actual Socrates has identity-with-Socrates [Plantinga] |
11987 | Counterpart Theory absurdly says I would be someone else if things went differently [Plantinga] |
16814 | Understanding is not mysterious - it is just more knowledge, of causes [Lipton] |
1816 | Sceptics say demonstration depends on self-demonstrating things, or indemonstrable things [Diog. Laertius] |
16825 | How do we distinguish negative from irrelevant evidence, if both match the hypothesis? [Lipton] |
6356 | Maybe a reliable justification must come from a process working with its 'proper function' [Plantinga, by Pollock/Cruz] |
1819 | Scepticism has two dogmas: that nothing is definable, and every argument has an opposite argument [Diog. Laertius] |
3064 | When sceptics say that nothing is definable, or all arguments have an opposite, they are being dogmatic [Diog. Laertius] |
16851 | The inference to observables and unobservables is almost the same, so why distinguish them? [Lipton] |
16799 | Inductive inference is not proof, but weighing evidence and probability [Lipton] |
16798 | We infer from evidence by working out what would explain that evidence [Lipton] |
16856 | It is more impressive that relativity predicted Mercury's orbit than if it had accommodated it [Lipton] |
16857 | Predictions are best for finding explanations, because mere accommodations can be fudged [Lipton] |
16827 | If we make a hypothesis about data, then a deduction, where does the hypothesis come from? [Lipton] |
16804 | Induction is repetition, instances, deduction, probability or causation [Lipton] |
16823 | Standard induction does not allow for vertical inferences, to some unobservable lower level [Lipton] |
3033 | Induction moves from some truths to similar ones, by contraries or consequents [Diog. Laertius] |
16800 | An inductive inference is underdetermined, by definition [Lipton] |
16858 | We can argue to support our beliefs, so induction will support induction, for believers in induction [Lipton] |
16832 | If something in ravens makes them black, it may be essential (definitive of ravens) [Lipton] |
16836 | My shoes are not white because they lack some black essence of ravens [Lipton] |
16831 | A theory may explain the blackness of a raven, but say nothing about the whiteness of shoes [Lipton] |
16833 | We can't turn non-black non-ravens into ravens, to test the theory [Lipton] |
16834 | To pick a suitable contrast to ravens, we need a hypothesis about their genes [Lipton] |
16802 | Bayes seems to rule out prior evidence, since that has a probability of one [Lipton] |
16801 | A hypothesis is confirmed if an unlikely prediction comes true [Lipton] |
16837 | Bayes involves 'prior' probabilities, 'likelihood', 'posterior' probability, and 'conditionalising' [Lipton] |
16839 | Explanation may be an important part of implementing Bayes's Theorem [Lipton] |
16803 | Bayes is too liberal, since any logical consequence of a hypothesis confirms it [Lipton] |
16850 | Explanation may describe induction, but may not show how it justifies, or leads to truth [Lipton] |
16807 | An explanation gives the reason the phenomenon occurred [Lipton] |
16808 | An explanation is what makes the unfamiliar familiar to us [Lipton] |
16806 | An explanation is what is added to knowledge to yield understanding [Lipton] |
16822 | Seaching for explanations is a good way to discover the structure of the world [Lipton] |
16816 | In 'contrastive' explanation there is a fact and a foil - why that fact, rather than this foil? [Lipton] |
16826 | With too many causes, find a suitable 'foil' for contrast, and the field narrows right down [Lipton] |
16811 | An explanation unifies a phenomenon with our account of other phenomena [Lipton] |
16810 | Deduction explanation is too easy; any law at all will imply the facts - together with the facts! [Lipton] |
16829 | We reject deductive explanations if they don't explain, not if the deduction is bad [Lipton] |
16809 | Good explanations may involve no laws and no deductions [Lipton] |
16812 | An explanation shows why it was necessary that the effect occurred [Lipton] |
16846 | A cause may not be an explanation [Lipton] |
16813 | To explain is to give either the causal history, or the causal mechanism [Lipton] |
16815 | Mathematical and philosophical explanations are not causal [Lipton] |
16849 | Explanations may be easier to find than causes [Lipton] |
16848 | Causal inferences are clearest when we can manipulate things [Lipton] |
16842 | We want to know not just the cause, but how the cause operated [Lipton] |
16840 | To maximise probability, don't go beyond your data [Lipton] |
16824 | Is Inference to the Best Explanation nothing more than inferring the likeliest cause? [Lipton] |
16817 | Best Explanation as a guide to inference is preferable to best standard explanations [Lipton] |
16818 | The 'likeliest' explanation is the best supported; the 'loveliest' gives the most understanding [Lipton] |
16819 | IBE is inferring that the best potential explanation is the actual explanation [Lipton] |
16820 | Finding the 'loveliest' potential explanation links truth to understanding [Lipton] |
16828 | IBE is not passive treatment of data, but involves feedback between theory and data search [Lipton] |
16844 | A contrasting difference is the cause if it offers the best explanation [Lipton] |
16853 | We select possible explanations for explanatory reasons, as well as choosing among them [Lipton] |
16821 | Must we only have one explanation, and must all the data be made relevant? [Lipton] |
16838 | Bayesians say best explanations build up an incoherent overall position [Lipton] |
16855 | The best theory is boring: compare 'all planets move elliptically' with 'most of them do' [Lipton] |
16852 | Best explanation can't be a guide to truth, because the truth must precede explanation [Lipton] |
9086 | The idea of abstract objects is not ontological; it comes from the epistemological idea of abstraction [Plantinga] |
9087 | Theists may see abstract objects as really divine thoughts [Plantinga] |
16469 | Plantinga has domains of sets of essences, variables denoting essences, and predicates as functions [Plantinga, by Stalnaker] |
16470 | Plantinga's essences have their own properties - so will have essences, giving a hierarchy [Stalnaker on Plantinga] |
14663 | Are propositions and states of affairs two separate things, or only one? I incline to say one [Plantinga] |
9085 | If propositions are concrete they don't have to exist, and so they can't be necessary truths [Plantinga] |
9084 | Propositions can't just be in brains, because 'there are no human beings' might be true [Plantinga] |
1838 | Cyrenaic pleasure is a motion, but Epicurean pleasure is a condition [Diog. Laertius] |
1769 | Cynics believe that when a man wishes for nothing he is like the gods [Diog. Laertius] |
16847 | Counterfactual causation makes causes necessary but not sufficient [Lipton] |
20704 | A possible world contains a being of maximal greatness - which is existence in all worlds [Plantinga, by Davies,B] |
1474 | Moral evil may be acceptable to God because it allows free will (even though we don't see why this is necessary) [Plantinga, by PG] |
1475 | It is logically possible that natural evil like earthquakes is caused by Satan [Plantinga, by PG] |