Combining Philosophers

All the ideas for H.Putnam/P.Oppenheim, W. David Ross and Robin Le Poidevin

expand these ideas     |    start again     |     specify just one area for these philosophers


89 ideas

3. Truth / B. Truthmakers / 10. Making Future Truths
In the tenseless view, all times are equally real, so statements of the future have truth-values [Le Poidevin]
7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 3. Being / d. Non-being
A thing which makes no difference seems unlikely to exist [Le Poidevin]
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 4. Belief / a. Beliefs
The goodness of opinions depends on their grounds, and corresponding degrees of conviction [Ross]
11. Knowledge Aims / B. Certain Knowledge / 1. Certainty
Knowledge is superior to opinion because it is certain [Ross]
12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 7. Causal Perception
I prefer the causal theory to sense data, because sensations are events, not apprehensions [Ross]
14. Science / B. Scientific Theories / 2. Aim of Science
We want illuminating theories, rather than coherent theories [Le Poidevin]
14. Science / B. Scientific Theories / 5. Commensurability
Two goods may be comparable, although they are not commensurable [Ross]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / a. Types of explanation
In addition to causal explanations, they can also be inferential, or definitional, or purposive [Le Poidevin]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / j. Explanations by reduction
Six reduction levels: groups, lives, cells, molecules, atoms, particles [Putnam/Oppenheim, by Watson]
17. Mind and Body / D. Property Dualism / 5. Supervenience of mind
Identical objects must have identical value [Ross]
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 9. Indexical Semantics
We don't just describe a time as 'now' from a private viewpoint, but as a fact about the world [Le Poidevin]
21. Aesthetics / A. Aesthetic Experience / 2. Aesthetic Attitude
Aesthetic enjoyment combines pleasure with insight [Ross]
21. Aesthetics / A. Aesthetic Experience / 4. Beauty
Beauty is neither objective nor subjective, but a power of producing certain mental events [Ross]
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 1. Nature of Ethics / e. Ethical cognitivism
Moral duties are as fundamental to the universe as the axioms of mathematics [Ross]
The beauty of a patch of colour might be the most important fact about it [Ross]
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / c. Ethical intuitionism
Ross said moral principles are self-evident from the facts, but not from pure thought [Ross, by Dancy,J]
The moral convictions of thoughtful educated people are the raw data of ethics [Ross]
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 1. Nature of Value / a. Nature of value
Value is held to be either a quality, or a relation (usually between a thing and a mind) [Ross]
The arguments for value being an objective or a relation fail, so it appears to be a quality [Ross]
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 1. Nature of Value / c. Objective value
The thing is intrinsically good if it would be good when nothing else existed [Ross]
All things being equal, we all prefer the virtuous to be happy, not the vicious [Ross]
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 1. Nature of Value / e. Means and ends
An instrumentally good thing might stay the same, but change its value because of circumstances [Ross]
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 2. Values / e. Death
It is disturbing if we become unreal when we die, but if time is unreal, then we remain real after death [Le Poidevin]
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 2. Values / j. Evil
Evil can't be an illusion, because then the illusion that there is evil would be evil [Le Poidevin]
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / a. Form of the Good
We can ask of pleasure or beauty whether they are valuable, but not of goodness [Ross]
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / b. Types of good
The four goods are: virtue, pleasure, just allocation of pleasure, and knowledge [Ross]
The three intrinsic goods are virtue, knowledge and pleasure [Ross]
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / c. Right and good
'Right' and 'good' differ in meaning, as in a 'right action' and a 'good man' [Ross]
If there are two equally good acts, they may both be right, but neither a duty [Ross]
In the past 'right' just meant what is conventionally accepted [Ross]
Goodness is a wider concept than just correct ethical conduct [Ross]
Motives decide whether an action is good, and what is done decides whether it was right [Ross]
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / d. Good as virtue
Virtue is superior to pleasure, as pleasure is never a duty, but goodness is [Ross]
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / e. Good as knowledge
All other things being equal, a universe with more understanding is better [Ross]
Morality is not entirely social; a good moral character should love truth [Ross]
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 3. Pleasure / c. Value of pleasure
We clearly value good character or understanding, as well as pleasure [Ross]
No one thinks it doesn't matter whether pleasure is virtuously or viciously acquired [Ross]
23. Ethics / B. Contract Ethics / 3. Promise Keeping
Promise-keeping is bound by the past, and is not concerned with consequences [Ross]
Promises create a new duty to a particular person; they aren't just a strategy to achieve well-being [Ross]
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 1. Virtue Theory / c. Particularism
Prima facie duties rest self-evidently on particular circumstance [Ross]
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 3. Virtues / h. Respect
People lose their rights if they do not respect the rights of others [Ross]
23. Ethics / D. Deontological Ethics / 2. Duty
We should do our duty, but not from a sense of duty [Ross]
We like people who act from love, but admire more the people who act from duty [Ross]
Be faithful, grateful, just, beneficent, non-malevolent, and improve yourself [Ross, by PG]
23. Ethics / D. Deontological Ethics / 4. Categorical Imperative
An act may be described in innumerable ways [Ross]
23. Ethics / E. Utilitarianism / 1. Utilitarianism
We should use money to pay debts before giving to charity [Ross]
23. Ethics / F. Existentialism / 1. Existentialism
Existentialism focuses on freedom and self-making, and insertion into the world [Le Poidevin]
25. Social Practice / C. Rights / 1. Basis of Rights
Rights were originally legal, and broadened to include other things [Ross]
25. Social Practice / F. Life Issues / 6. Animal Rights
Rights can be justly claimed, so animals have no rights, as they cannot claim any [Ross]
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 1. Causation
The logical properties of causation are asymmetry, transitivity and irreflexivity [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / C. Space / 3. Points in Space
We can identify unoccupied points in space, so they must exist [Le Poidevin]
If spatial points exist, then they must be stationary, by definition [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / C. Space / 4. Substantival Space
Absolute space explains actual and potential positions, and geometrical truths [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / C. Space / 5. Relational Space
For relationists moving an object beyond the edge of space creates new space [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / C. Space / 6. Space-Time
We distinguish time from space, because it passes, and it has a unique present moment [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / e. Eventless time
Since nothing occurs in a temporal vacuum, there is no way to measure its length [Le Poidevin]
Temporal vacuums would be unexperienced, unmeasured, and unending [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / g. Growing block
If the future is not real, we don't seem to have any obligation to future individuals [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / h. Presentism
If things don't persist through time, then change makes no sense [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / b. Rate of time
Time can't speed up or slow down, so it doesn't seem to be a 'process' [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / c. Tenses and time
At the very least, minds themselves seem to be tensed [Le Poidevin]
Fiction seems to lack a tensed perspective, and offers an example of tenseless language [Le Poidevin]
It is the view of the future that really decides between tensed and tenseless views of time [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / d. Time series
In the B-series, time-positions are unchanging; in the A-series they change (from future to present to past) [Le Poidevin]
Things which have ceased change their A-series position; things that persist change their B-series position [Le Poidevin]
A-theory says past, present, future and flow exist; B-theory says this just reports our perspective [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / e. Tensed (A) series
It is claimed that the tense view entails the unreality of both future and past [Le Poidevin]
Tensed theorists typically try to reduce the tenseless to the tensed [Le Poidevin]
We share a common now, but not a common here [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / f. Tenseless (B) series
The new tenseless theory offers indexical truth-conditions, instead of a reductive analysis [Le Poidevin]
To say that the past causes the present needs them both to be equally real [Le Poidevin]
The B-series doesn't seem to allow change [Le Poidevin]
If the B-universe is eternal, why am I trapped in a changing moment of it? [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / g. Time's arrow
Time's arrow is not causal if there is no temporal gap between cause and effect [Le Poidevin]
An ordered series can be undirected, but time favours moving from earlier to later [Le Poidevin]
If time's arrow is causal, how can there be non-simultaneous events that are causally unconnected? [Le Poidevin]
If time's arrow is psychological then different minds can impose different orders on events [Le Poidevin]
There are Thermodynamic, Psychological and Causal arrows of time [Le Poidevin]
Presumably if time's arrow is thermodynamic then time ends when entropy is complete [Le Poidevin]
If time is thermodynamic then entropy is necessary - but the theory says it is probable [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / i. Time and motion
Instantaneous motion is an intrinsic disposition to be elsewhere [Le Poidevin]
The dynamic view of motion says it is primitive, and not reducible to objects, properties and times [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / k. Temporal truths
If the present could have diverse pasts, then past truths can't have present truthmakers [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 3. Parts of Time / a. Beginning of time
The present is the past/future boundary, so the first moment of time was not present [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 3. Parts of Time / c. Intervals
The primitive parts of time are intervals, not instants [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 3. Parts of Time / e. Present moment
If time is infinitely divisible, then the present must be infinitely short [Le Poidevin]
27. Natural Reality / E. Cosmology / 10. Multiverse
The multiverse is distinct time-series, as well as spaces [Le Poidevin]
28. God / A. Divine Nature / 5. God and Time
God being inside or outside of time both raise a group of difficult problems [Le Poidevin]
How could a timeless God know what time it is? So could God be both timeless and omniscient? [Le Poidevin]