52 ideas
| 13939 | No possible evidence could decide the reality of numbers, so it is a pseudo-question [Carnap] |
| 16252 | Metaphysics uses empty words, or just produces pseudo-statements [Carnap] |
| 13342 | Carnap defined consequence by contradiction, but this is unintuitive and changes with substitution [Tarski on Carnap] |
| 13251 | Each person is free to build their own logic, just by specifying a syntax [Carnap] |
| 13936 | Questions about numbers are answered by analysis, and are analytic, and hence logically true [Carnap] |
| 8748 | Logical positivists incorporated geometry into logicism, saying axioms are just definitions [Carnap, by Shapiro] |
| 8960 | Internal questions about abstractions are trivial, and external ones deeply problematic [Carnap, by Szabó] |
| 13933 | Existence questions are 'internal' (within a framework) or 'external' (concerning the whole framework) [Carnap] |
| 13934 | To be 'real' is to be an element of a system, so we cannot ask reality questions about the system itself [Carnap] |
| 13938 | A linguistic framework involves commitment to entities, so only commitment to the framework is in question [Carnap] |
| 13935 | We only accept 'things' within a language with formation, testing and acceptance rules [Carnap] |
| 14305 | In the truth-functional account a burnt-up match was soluble because it never entered water [Carnap] |
| 13932 | Empiricists tend to reject abstract entities, and to feel sympathy with nominalism [Carnap] |
| 13937 | New linguistic claims about entities are not true or false, but just expedient, fruitful or successful [Carnap] |
| 18699 | Carnap tried to define all scientific predicates in terms of primitive relations, using type theory [Carnap, by Button] |
| 13940 | All linguistic forms in science are merely judged by their efficiency as instruments [Carnap] |
| 13048 | Good explications are exact, fruitful, simple and similar to the explicandum [Carnap, by Salmon] |
| 4363 | The word 'person' is useless in ethics, because what counts as a good or bad self-conscious being? [Hursthouse] |
| 12131 | All concepts can be derived from a few basics, making possible one science of everything [Carnap, by Brody] |
| 11968 | The intension of a sentence is the set of all possible worlds in which it is true [Carnap, by Kaplan] |
| 18285 | All translation loses some content (but language does not create reality) [Carnap] |
| 4355 | There may be inverse akrasia, where the agent's action is better than their judgement recommends [Hursthouse] |
| 4325 | Must all actions be caused in part by a desire, or can a belief on its own be sufficient? [Hursthouse] |
| 4351 | It is a fantasy that only through the study of philosophy can one become virtuous [Hursthouse] |
| 4340 | You are not a dishonest person if a tragic dilemma forces you to do something dishonest [Hursthouse] |
| 4329 | After a moral dilemma is resolved there is still a 'remainder', requiring (say) regret [Hursthouse] |
| 4330 | Deontologists resolve moral dilemmas by saying the rule conflict is merely apparent [Hursthouse] |
| 4341 | Involuntary actions performed in tragic dilemmas are bad because they mar a good life [Hursthouse] |
| 4358 | Virtue may be neither sufficient nor necessary for eudaimonia [Hursthouse] |
| 4337 | Teenagers are often quite wise about ideals, but rather stupid about consequences [Hursthouse] |
| 4324 | Animals and plants can 'flourish', but only rational beings can have eudaimonia [Hursthouse] |
| 4359 | When it comes to bringing up children, most of us think that the virtues are the best bet [Hursthouse] |
| 20195 | Eudaimonia first; virtue is a trait which promotes it; right acts are what virtues produce [Hursthouse, by Zagzebski] |
| 4336 | Any strict ranking of virtues or rules gets abandoned when faced with particular cases [Hursthouse] |
| 4334 | Virtue ethics is open to the objection that it fails to show priority among the virtues [Hursthouse] |
| 4361 | Good animals can survive, breed, feel characteristic pleasure and pain, and contribute to the group [Hursthouse] |
| 4349 | Virtuous people may not be fully clear about their reasons for action [Hursthouse] |
| 4352 | Performing an act simply because it is virtuous is sufficient to be 'morally motivated' or 'dutiful' [Hursthouse] |
| 4353 | If moral motivation is an all-or-nothing sense of duty, how can children act morally? [Hursthouse] |
| 4346 | The emotions of sympathy, compassion and love are no guarantee of right action or acting well [Hursthouse] |
| 4339 | According to virtue ethics, two agents may respond differently, and yet both be right [Hursthouse] |
| 4354 | Maybe in a deeply poisoned character none of their milder character traits could ever be a virtue [Hursthouse] |
| 4364 | Being unusually virtuous in some areas may entail being less virtuous in others [Hursthouse] |
| 4356 | We are puzzled by a person who can show an exceptional virtue and also behave very badly [Hursthouse] |
| 4327 | Deontologists do consider consequences, because they reveal when a rule might apply [Hursthouse] |
| 4335 | 'Codifiable' morality give rules for decisions which don't require wisdom [Hursthouse] |
| 4328 | Preference utilitarianism aims to be completely value-free, or empirical [Hursthouse] |
| 4343 | We are torn between utilitarian and deontological views of lying, depending on the examples [Hursthouse] |
| 4338 | Deontologists usually accuse utilitarians of oversimplifying hard cases [Hursthouse] |
| 4365 | We are distinct from other animals in behaving rationally - pursuing something as good, for reasons [Hursthouse] |
| 4350 | If people are virtuous in obedience to God, would they become wicked if they lost their faith? [Hursthouse] |
| 1513 | The Egyptians were the first to say the soul is immortal and reincarnated [Herodotus] |