73 ideas
3358 | Metaphysics focuses on Platonism, essentialism, materialism and anti-realism [Benardete,JA] |
3312 | There are the 'is' of predication (a function), the 'is' of identity (equals), and the 'is' of existence (quantifier) [Benardete,JA] |
3352 | Analytical philosophy analyses separate concepts successfully, but lacks a synoptic vision of the results [Benardete,JA] |
3329 | Presumably the statements of science are true, but should they be taken literally or not? [Benardete,JA] |
15787 | Maybe Ockham's Razor is a purely aesthetic principle [Lycan] |
15784 | The Razor seems irrelevant for Meinongians, who allow absolutely everything to exist [Lycan] |
3326 | Set theory attempts to reduce the 'is' of predication to mathematics [Benardete,JA] |
3327 | The set of Greeks is included in the set of men, but isn't a member of it [Benardete,JA] |
3335 | The standard Z-F Intuition version of set theory has about ten agreed axioms [Benardete,JA, by PG] |
6548 | Physicalism requires the naturalisation or rejection of set theory [Lycan] |
7755 | Singular terms refer, using proper names, definite descriptions, singular personal pronouns, demonstratives, etc. [Lycan] |
3332 | Greeks saw the science of proportion as the link between geometry and arithmetic [Benardete,JA] |
3330 | Negatives, rationals, irrationals and imaginaries are all postulated to solve baffling equations [Benardete,JA] |
3337 | Natural numbers are seen in terms of either their ordinality (Peano), or cardinality (set theory) [Benardete,JA] |
3310 | If slowness is a property of walking rather than the walker, we must allow that events exist [Benardete,JA] |
6531 | Institutions are not reducible as types, but they are as tokens [Lycan] |
6532 | Types cannot be reduced, but levels of reduction are varied groupings of the same tokens [Lycan] |
6534 | One location may contain molecules, a metal strip, a key, an opener of doors, and a human tragedy [Lycan] |
5500 | Biologists see many organic levels, 'abstract' if seen from below, 'structural' if seen from above [Lycan] |
16062 | A necessary relation between fact-levels seems to be a further irreducible fact [Lynch/Glasgow] |
16061 | If some facts 'logically supervene' on some others, they just redescribe them, adding nothing [Lynch/Glasgow] |
12793 | Early pre-Socratics had a mass-noun ontology, which was replaced by count-nouns [Benardete,JA] |
16060 | Nonreductive materialism says upper 'levels' depend on lower, but don't 'reduce' [Lynch/Glasgow] |
16064 | The hallmark of physicalism is that each causal power has a base causal power under it [Lynch/Glasgow] |
6529 | I see the 'role'/'occupant' distinction as fundamental to metaphysics [Lycan] |
3353 | If there is no causal interaction with transcendent Platonic objects, how can you learn about them? [Benardete,JA] |
15792 | Maybe non-existent objects are sets of properties [Lycan] |
3304 | Why should packed-together particles be a thing (Mt Everest), but not scattered ones? [Benardete,JA] |
3350 | Could a horse lose the essential property of being a horse, and yet continue to exist? [Benardete,JA] |
3309 | If a soldier continues to exist after serving as a soldier, does the wind cease to exist after it ceases to blow? [Benardete,JA] |
3351 | One can step into the same river twice, but not into the same water [Benardete,JA] |
3314 | Absolutists might accept that to exist is relative, but relative to what? How about relative to itself? [Benardete,JA] |
3323 | Maybe self-identity isn't existence, if Pegasus can be self-identical but non-existent [Benardete,JA] |
5494 | 'Lightning is electric discharge' and 'Phosphorus is Venus' are synthetic a posteriori identities [Lycan] |
15795 | Treating possible worlds as mental needs more actual mental events [Lycan] |
15796 | Possible worlds must be made of intensional objects like propositions or properties [Lycan] |
15794 | If 'worlds' are sentences, and possibility their consistency, consistency may rely on possibility [Lycan] |
6549 | I think greenness is a complex microphysical property of green objects [Lycan] |
3306 | The clearest a priori knowledge is proving non-existence through contradiction [Benardete,JA] |
3349 | If we know truths about prime numbers, we seem to have synthetic a priori knowledge of Platonic objects [Benardete,JA] |
3341 | Logical positivism amounts to no more than 'there is no synthetic a priori' [Benardete,JA] |
3344 | Assertions about existence beyond experience can only be a priori synthetic [Benardete,JA] |
3345 | Appeals to intuition seem to imply synthetic a priori knowledge [Benardete,JA] |
6543 | Intentionality comes in degrees [Lycan] |
6537 | Teleological views allow for false intentional content, unlike causal and nomological theories [Lycan] |
6546 | Pain is composed of urges, desires, impulses etc, at different levels of abstraction [Lycan] |
6547 | The right 'level' for qualia is uncertain, though top (behaviourism) and bottom (particles) are false [Lycan] |
6527 | If energy in the brain disappears into thin air, this breaches physical conservation laws [Lycan] |
6528 | In lower animals, psychology is continuous with chemistry, and humans are continuous with animals [Lycan] |
6554 | Two behaviourists meet. The first says,"You're fine; how am I?" [Lycan] |
6545 | If functionalism focuses on folk psychology, it ignores lower levels of function [Lycan] |
6541 | Functionalism must not be too abstract to allow inverted spectrum, or so structural that it becomes chauvinistic [Lycan] |
5496 | Functionalism has three linked levels: physical, functional, and mental [Lycan] |
6539 | The distinction between software and hardware is not clear in computing [Lycan] |
6533 | Mental types are a subclass of teleological types at a high level of functional abstraction [Lycan] |
6535 | Teleological characterisations shade off smoothly into brutely physical ones [Lycan] |
5499 | A mental state is a functional realisation of a brain state when it serves the purpose of the organism [Lycan] |
6544 | Identity theory is functionalism, but located at the lowest level of abstraction [Lycan] |
6530 | We reduce the mind through homuncular groups, described abstractly by purpose [Lycan] |
6536 | Teleological functionalism helps us to understand psycho-biological laws [Lycan] |
6542 | A Martian may exhibit human-like behaviour while having very different sensations [Lycan] |
7768 | The truth conditions theory sees meaning as representation [Lycan] |
7766 | Meaning must be known before we can consider verification [Lycan] |
7764 | Could I successfully use an expression, without actually understanding it? [Lycan] |
7763 | It is hard to state a rule of use for a proper name [Lycan] |
7770 | Truth conditions will come out the same for sentences with 'renate' or 'cordate' [Lycan] |
7773 | A sentence's truth conditions is the set of possible worlds in which the sentence is true [Lycan] |
7774 | Possible worlds explain aspects of meaning neatly - entailment, for example, is the subset relation [Lycan] |
6538 | We need a notion of teleology that comes in degrees [Lycan] |
5501 | People are trying to explain biological teleology in naturalistic causal terms [Lycan] |
6551 | 'Physical' means either figuring in physics descriptions, or just located in space-time [Lycan] |
3334 | Rationalists see points as fundamental, but empiricists prefer regions [Benardete,JA] |
3308 | In the ontological argument a full understanding of the concept of God implies a contradiction in 'There is no God' [Benardete,JA] |