75 ideas
| 6259 | Why can't a wise man doubt everything? [Montaigne] |
| 6263 | No wisdom could make us comfortably walk a wide beam if it was high in the air [Montaigne] |
| 23122 | Montaigne was the founding father of liberalism [Montaigne, by Gopnik] |
| 16606 | Original philosophers invariably seek inspiration from past thinkers [Pasnau] |
| 16604 | Philosophy consists of choosing between Plato, Aristotle and Democritus [Pasnau] |
| 16586 | The commentaries of Averroes were the leading guide to Aristotle [Pasnau] |
| 16568 | Modernity begins in the late 12th century, with Averroes's commentaries on Aristotle [Pasnau] |
| 16653 | Once accidents were seen as real, 'Categories' became the major text for ontology [Pasnau] |
| 16704 | In 1347, the Church effectively stopped philosophy for the next 300 years [Pasnau] |
| 16605 | After c.1450 all of Plato was available. Before that, only the first half of 'Timaeus' was known [Pasnau] |
| 16607 | Renaissance Platonism is peripheral [Pasnau] |
| 16715 | Plato only made an impact locally in 15th century Italy [Pasnau] |
| 16610 | Philosophy could easily have died in 17th century, if it weren't for Descartes [Pasnau] |
| 16781 | The 17th century is a metaphysical train wreck [Pasnau] |
| 16677 | Anti-Razor: if you can't account for a truth, keep positing things until you can [Pasnau] |
| 6258 | Virtue is the distinctive mark of truth, and its greatest product [Montaigne] |
| 16598 | Priority was a major topic of dispute for scholastics [Pasnau] |
| 16727 | In mixtures, the four elements ceased to exist, replaced by a mixed body with a form [Pasnau] |
| 6262 | We lack some sense or other, and hence objects may have hidden features [Montaigne] |
| 16732 | 17th C qualities are either microphysical, or phenomenal, or powers [Pasnau] |
| 16733 | 17th century authors only recognised categorical properties, never dispositions [Pasnau] |
| 16662 | The biggest question for scholastics is whether properties are real, or modes of substances [Pasnau] |
| 16767 | There is no centralised power, but we still need essence for a metaphysical understanding [Pasnau] |
| 16788 | Instead of adding Aristotelian forms to physical stuff, one could add dispositions [Pasnau] |
| 16738 | Scholastics reject dispositions, because they are not actual, as forms require [Pasnau] |
| 16649 | Scholastics say there is a genuine thing if it is 'separable' [Pasnau] |
| 16785 | If you reject essences, questions of individuation become extremely difficult [Pasnau] |
| 16680 | Scholastics thought Quantity could be the principle of individuation [Pasnau] |
| 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] |
| 16617 | Corpuscularian critics of scholasticism say only substances exist [Pasnau] |
| 16741 | Scholastics wanted to treat Aristotelianism as physics, rather than as metaphysics [Pasnau] |
| 16777 | If crowds are things at all, they seem to be Substances, since they bear properties [Pasnau] |
| 16628 | Corpuscularianism promised a decent account of substance [Pasnau] |
| 16615 | Scholastics use 'substantia' for thick concrete entities, and for thin metaphysical ones [Pasnau] |
| 16775 | For corpuscularians, a substance is just its integral parts [Pasnau] |
| 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] |
| 16769 | If clay survives destruction of the statue, the statue wasn't a substance, but a mere accident [Pasnau] |
| 14750 | Two entities can coincide as one, but only one of them (the dominant sortal) fixes persistence conditions [Burke,M, by Sider] |
| 16602 | Corpuscularianism rejected not only form, but also the dependence of matter on form [Pasnau] |
| 16612 | Hylomorphism may not be a rival to science, but an abstract account of unity and endurance [Pasnau] |
| 16613 | Hylomorphism declined because scholastics made it into a testable physical theory [Pasnau] |
| 16747 | Scholastics made forms substantial, in a way unintended by Aristotle [Pasnau] |
| 16759 | Scholastics began to see substantial form more as Aristotle's 'efficient' cause [Pasnau] |
| 16748 | Aquinas says a substance has one form; Scotists say it has many forms [Pasnau] |
| 16671 | Scholastic Quantity either gives a body parts, or spreads them out in a unified way [Pasnau] |
| 16579 | There may be different types of substrate, or temporary substrates [Pasnau] |
| 16596 | A substratum can't be 'bare', because it has a job to do [Pasnau] |
| 16584 | If a substrate gives causal support for change, quite a lot of the ingredients must endure [Pasnau] |
| 16580 | A substrate may be 'prime matter', which endures through every change [Pasnau] |
| 16749 | Aristotelians deny that all necessary properties are essential [Pasnau] |
| 16694 | Typical successive things are time and motion [Pasnau] |
| 16583 | Weak ex nihilo says it all comes from something; strong version says the old must partly endure [Pasnau] |
| 6260 | Sceptics say there is truth, but no means of making or testing lasting judgements [Montaigne] |
| 16783 | Essences must explain, so we can infer them causally from the accidents [Pasnau] |
| 6261 | The soul is in the brain, as shown by head injuries [Montaigne] |
| 7496 | Rules and duties are based on the will, as that is all we control [Montaigne] |
| 7495 | Apart from the fear, dying is an easy duty [Montaigne] |
| 22269 | We must fight fiercely to hang on to the few pleasures which survive into old age [Montaigne] |
| 20482 | Virtue inspires Stoics, but I want a good temperament [Montaigne] |
| 20480 | There is not much point in only becoming good near the end of your life [Montaigne] |
| 20481 | Nothing we say can be worse than unsaying it in the face of authority [Montaigne] |
| 20479 | People at home care far more than soldiers risking death about the outcome of wars [Montaigne] |
| 16609 | Atomists say causation is mechanical collisions, and all true qualities are microscopic [Pasnau] |
| 16603 | In the 17th C matter became body, and was then studied by science [Pasnau] |
| 16592 | Atomism is the commonest version of corpuscularianism, but isn't required by it [Pasnau] |
| 16750 | If there are just arrangements of corpuscles, where are the boundaries between substances? [Pasnau] |
| 16722 | Scholastic causation is by changes in the primary qualities of hot, cold, wet, dry [Pasnau] |
| 16760 | Substantial forms were a step towards scientific essentialism [Pasnau] |
| 16581 | Scholastic authors agree that matter was created by God, out of nothing [Pasnau] |
| 16642 | Transubstantion says accidents of bread and wine don't inhere in the substance [Pasnau] |