35 ideas
| 16554 | Activities have place, rate, duration, entities, properties, modes, direction, polarity, energy and range [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 5311 | If observation goes up a level, we expect the laws of the lower level to remain in force [Wilson,EO] |
| 16556 | Penicillin causes nothing; the cause is what penicillin does [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 5312 | A child first sees objects as distinct, and later as members of groups [Wilson,EO] |
| 16235 | Persistence conditions cannot contradict, so there must be a 'dominant sortal' [Burke,M, by Hawley] |
| 14753 | The 'dominant' of two coinciding sortals is the one that entails the widest range of properties [Burke,M, by Sider] |
| 16072 | 'The rock' either refers to an object, or to a collection of parts, or to some stuff [Burke,M, by Wasserman] |
| 14751 | Tib goes out of existence when the tail is lost, because Tib was never the 'cat' [Burke,M, by Sider] |
| 16071 | Sculpting a lump of clay destroys one object, and replaces it with another one [Burke,M, by Wasserman] |
| 16234 | Burke says when two object coincide, one of them is destroyed in the process [Burke,M, by Hawley] |
| 13278 | Maybe the clay becomes a different lump when it becomes a statue [Burke,M, by Koslicki] |
| 14750 | Two entities can coincide as one, but only one of them (the dominant sortal) fixes persistence conditions [Burke,M, by Sider] |
| 16562 | We understand something by presenting its low-level entities and activities [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 5309 | Beliefs are really enabling mechanisms for survival [Wilson,EO] |
| 16563 | The explanation is not the regularity, but the activity sustaining it [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 16555 | Functions are not properties of objects, they are activities contributing to mechanisms [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 16529 | Mechanisms are systems organised to produce regular change [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 16530 | A mechanism explains a phenomenon by showing how it was produced [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 16553 | Our account of mechanism combines both entities and activities [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 16559 | Descriptions of explanatory mechanisms have a bottom level, where going further is irrelevant [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 16528 | Mechanisms are not just push-pull systems [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 16564 | There are four types of bottom-level activities which will explain phenomena [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 16561 | We can abstract by taking an exemplary case and ignoring the detail [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 5310 | Philosophers study the consequences of ethics instead of its origins [Wilson,EO] |
| 22187 | Genetic behaviours that have enhanced human success include aggression, rape and xenophobia [Wilson,EO, by Okasha] |
| 5313 | The rules of human decision-making converge and overlap in a 'human nature' [Wilson,EO] |
| 5316 | We undermine altruism by rewarding it, but we reward it to encourage it [Wilson,EO] |
| 5318 | Pure hard-core altruism based on kin selection is the enemy of civilisation [Wilson,EO] |
| 5317 | The actor is most convincing who believes that his performance is real [Wilson,EO] |
| 20662 | The biology of societies: kin selection, parenting, mating; status, territory, contracts [Wilson,EO] |
| 5308 | The only human purpose is that created by our genetic history [Wilson,EO] |
| 16558 | Laws of nature have very little application in biology [Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
| 5314 | Cultural evolution is Lamarckian and fast, biological evolution is Darwinian and slow [Wilson,EO] |
| 5315 | Over 99 percent of human evolution has been in the hunter-gatherer phase [Wilson,EO] |
| 5320 | It is estimated that mankind has produced 100,000 religions [Wilson,EO] |