48 ideas
| 23770 | Reductive analysis makes a concept clearer, by giving an alternative simpler set [Williams,NE] |
| 4456 | Epistemological Ockham's Razor demands good reasons, but the ontological version says reality is simple [Moreland] |
| 23769 | Promoting an ontology by its implied good metaphysic is an 'argument-by-display' [Williams,NE] |
| 23783 | Change exists, it is causal, and it needs an explanation [Williams,NE] |
| 23784 | Processes don't begin or end; they just change direction unexpectedly [Williams,NE] |
| 23790 | Processes are either strings of short unchanging states, or continuous and unreducible events [Williams,NE] |
| 23786 | The status quo is part of what exists, and so needs metaphysical explanation [Williams,NE] |
| 4474 | Existence theories must match experience, possibility, logic and knowledge, and not be self-defeating [Moreland] |
| 23768 | A metaphysic is a set of wider explanations derived from a basic ontology [Williams,NE] |
| 23773 | Humeans say properties are passive, possibility is vast, laws are descriptions, causation is weak [Williams,NE] |
| 23779 | We shouldn't posit the existence of anything we have a word for [Williams,NE] |
| 4461 | Tropes are like Hume's 'impressions', conceived as real rather than as ideal [Moreland] |
| 4462 | A colour-trope cannot be simple (as required), because it is spread in space, and so it is complex [Moreland] |
| 4463 | In 'four colours were used in the decoration', colours appear to be universals, not tropes [Moreland] |
| 23780 | Every possible state of affairs is written into its originating powers [Williams,NE] |
| 23789 | Naming powers is unwise, because that it usually done by a single manifestation [Williams,NE] |
| 23775 | Powers are 'multi-track' if they can produce a variety of manifestations [Williams,NE] |
| 23771 | Fundamental physics describes everything in terms of powers [Williams,NE] |
| 23776 | Rather than pure powers or pure categoricals, I favour basics which are both at once [Williams,NE] |
| 23777 | Powers are more complicated than properties which are always on display [Williams,NE] |
| 23774 | There are basic powers, which underlie dispositions, potentialities, capacities etc [Williams,NE] |
| 23791 | Dispositions are just useful descriptions, which are explained by underlying powers [Williams,NE] |
| 4451 | If properties are universals, what distinguishes two things which have identical properties? [Moreland] |
| 4453 | One realism is one-over-many, which may be the model/copy view, which has the Third Man problem [Moreland] |
| 4464 | Realists see properties as universals, which are single abstract entities which are multiply exemplifiable [Moreland] |
| 4449 | Evidence for universals can be found in language, communication, natural laws, classification and ideals [Moreland] |
| 4450 | The traditional problem of universals centres on the "One over Many", which is the unity of natural classes [Moreland] |
| 4454 | The One-In-Many view says universals have abstract existence, but exist in particulars [Moreland] |
| 4468 | How could 'being even', or 'being a father', or a musical interval, exist naturally in space? [Moreland] |
| 4452 | Maybe universals are real, if properties themselves have properties, and relate to other properties [Moreland] |
| 4467 | A naturalist and realist about universals is forced to say redness can be both moving and stationary [Moreland] |
| 4469 | There are spatial facts about red particulars, but not about redness itself [Moreland] |
| 4472 | Redness is independent of red things, can do without them, has its own properties, and has identity [Moreland] |
| 4459 | Moderate nominalism attempts to embrace the existence of properties while avoiding universals [Moreland] |
| 4458 | Unlike Class Nominalism, Resemblance Nominalism can distinguish natural from unnatural classes [Moreland] |
| 4457 | There can be predicates with no property, and there are properties with no predicate [Moreland] |
| 4471 | We should abandon the concept of a property since (unlike sets) their identity conditions are unclear [Moreland] |
| 23772 | If objects are property bundles, the properties need combining powers [Williams,NE] |
| 23788 | Four-Dimensional is Perdurantism (temporal parts), plus Eternalism [Williams,NE] |
| 4476 | Most philosophers think that the identity of indiscernibles is false [Moreland] |
| 4460 | Abstractions are formed by the mind when it concentrates on some, but not all, the features of a thing [Moreland] |
| 4455 | It is always open to a philosopher to claim that some entity or other is unanalysable [Moreland] |
| 23785 | Causation needs to explain stasis, as well as change [Williams,NE] |
| 23782 | Causation is the exercise of powers [Williams,NE] |
| 23787 | If causes and effects overlap, that makes changes impossible [Williams,NE] |
| 23778 | Powers contain lawlike features, pointing to possible future states [Williams,NE] |
| 4473 | 'Presentism' is the view that only the present moment exists [Moreland] |
| 1513 | The Egyptians were the first to say the soul is immortal and reincarnated [Herodotus] |