218 ideas
16395 | Kripke separated semantics from metaphysics, rather than linking them, making the latter independent [Kripke, by Stalnaker] |
17034 | Analyses of concepts using entirely different terms are very inclined to fail [Kripke] |
4955 | Some definitions aim to fix a reference rather than give a meaning [Kripke] |
15327 | Kripke's semantic theory has actually inspired promising axiomatic theories [Kripke, by Horsten] |
15343 | Kripke offers a semantic theory of truth (involving models) [Kripke, by Horsten] |
14966 | The Tarskian move to a metalanguage may not be essential for truth theories [Kripke, by Gupta] |
14967 | Certain three-valued languages can contain their own truth predicates [Kripke, by Gupta] |
16328 | Kripke classified fixed points, and illuminated their use for clarifications [Kripke, by Halbach] |
10163 | Propositional modal logic has been proved to be complete [Kripke, by Feferman/Feferman] |
10559 | Kripke's modal semantics presupposes certain facts about possible worlds [Kripke, by Zalta] |
16985 | Possible worlds allowed the application of set-theoretic models to modal logic [Kripke] |
10760 | With possible worlds, S4 and S5 are sound and complete, but S1-S3 are not even sound [Kripke, by Rossberg] |
16189 | The variable domain approach to quantified modal logic invalidates the Barcan Formula [Kripke, by Simchen] |
15132 | The Barcan formulas fail in models with varying domains [Kripke, by Williamson] |
13479 | Given that thinking aims at truth, logic gives universal rules for how to do it [Burge] |
8132 | We now have a much more sophisticated understanding of logical form in language [Burge] |
10437 | Names are rigid, making them unlike definite descriptions [Kripke, by Sainsbury] |
4949 | Names are rigid designators, which designate the same object in all possible worlds [Kripke] |
4951 | A bundle of qualities is a collection of abstractions, so it can't be a particular [Kripke] |
17031 | A name can still refer even if it satisfies none of its well-known descriptions [Kripke] |
9175 | We may fix the reference of 'Cicero' by a description, but thereafter the name is rigid [Kripke] |
8957 | Some references, such as 'Neptune', have to be fixed by description rather than baptism [Kripke, by Szabó] |
9171 | The function of names is simply to refer [Kripke] |
10428 | Proper names must have referents, because they are not descriptive [Kripke, by Sainsbury] |
4959 | A name's reference is not fixed by any marks or properties of the referent [Kripke] |
16982 | A man has two names if the historical chains are different - even if they are the same! [Kripke] |
10792 | The substitutional quantifier is not in competition with the standard interpretation [Kripke, by Marcus (Barcan)] |
17622 | We come to believe mathematical propositions via their grounding in the structure [Burge] |
16901 | The equivalent algebra model of geometry loses some essential spatial meaning [Burge] |
9159 | You can't simply convert geometry into algebra, as some spatial content is lost [Burge] |
16902 | Peano arithmetic requires grasping 0 as a primitive number [Burge] |
19482 | Current physics says matter and antimatter should have reduced to light at the big bang [New Sci.] |
19483 | CP violation shows a decay imbalance in matter and antimatter, leading to matter's dominance [New Sci.] |
14896 | Kripke's metaphysics (essences, kinds, rigidity) blocks the slide into sociology [Kripke, by Ladyman/Ross] |
17000 | We might fix identities for small particulars, but it is utopian to hope for such things [Kripke] |
17647 | Kripke individuates objects by essential modal properties (and presupposes essentialism) [Kripke, by Putnam] |
16995 | Given that a table is made of molecules, could it not be molecular and still be this table? [Kripke] |
17047 | If we imagine this table made of ice or different wood, we are imagining a different table [Kripke] |
11868 | A different piece of wood could have been used for that table; constitution isn't identity [Wiggins on Kripke] |
5450 | For Kripke, essence is origin; for Putnam, essence is properties; for Wiggins, essence is membership of a kind [Kripke, by Mautner] |
17055 | Atomic number 79 is part of the nature of the gold we know [Kripke] |
16997 | An essential property is true of an object in any case where it would have existed [Kripke] |
17045 | De re modality is an object having essential properties [Kripke] |
17030 | Important properties of an object need not be essential to it [Kripke] |
16955 | Kripke says internal structure fixes species; I say it is genetic affinity and a common descent [Kripke, by Dummett] |
16996 | Given that Nixon is indeed a human being, that he might not have been does not concern knowledge [Kripke] |
13971 | Kripke claims that some properties, only knowable posteriori, are known a priori to be essential [Kripke, by Soames] |
12100 | An essence is the necessary properties, derived from an intuitive identity, in origin, type and material [Kripke, by Witt] |
16991 | No one seems to know the identity conditions for a material object (or for people) over time [Kripke] |
11867 | If we lose track of origin, how do we show we are maintaining a reference? [Kripke, by Wiggins] |
12018 | Kripke argues, of the Queen, that parents of an organism are essentially so [Kripke, by Forbes,G] |
17046 | Could the actual Queen have been born of different parents? [Kripke] |
8274 | Socrates can't have a necessary origin, because he might have had no 'origin' [Lowe on Kripke] |
16981 | With the necessity of self-identity plus Leibniz's Law, identity has to be an 'internal' relation [Kripke] |
17044 | A relation can clearly be reflexive, and identity is the smallest reflexive relation [Kripke] |
17036 | Identity statements can be contingent if they rely on descriptions [Kripke] |
17038 | If Hesperus and Phosophorus are the same, they can't possibly be different [Kripke] |
4942 | The indiscernibility of identicals is as self-evident as the law of contradiction [Kripke] |
16999 | A vague identity may seem intransitive, and we might want to talk of 'counterparts' [Kripke] |
11880 | Kripke says his necessary a posteriori examples are known a priori to be necessary [Kripke, by Mackie,P] |
17058 | What many people consider merely physically necessary I consider completely necessary [Kripke] |
4797 | Instead of being regularities, maybe natural laws are the weak a posteriori necessities of Kripke [Kripke, by Psillos] |
4970 | What is often held to be mere physical necessity is actually metaphysical necessity [Kripke] |
17037 | Physical necessity may be necessity in the highest degree [Kripke] |
17059 | Unicorns are vague, so no actual or possible creature could count as a unicorn [Kripke] |
16984 | I don't think possible worlds reductively reveal the natures of modal operators etc. [Kripke] |
4728 | Kripke separates necessary and a priori, proposing necessary a posteriori and contingent a priori examples [Kripke, by O'Grady] |
16990 | A priori = Necessary because we imagine all worlds, and we know without looking at actuality? [Kripke] |
9386 | The meter is defined necessarily, but the stick being one meter long is contingent a priori [Kripke] |
9385 | The very act of designating of an object with properties gives knowledge of a contingent truth [Kripke] |
4960 | "'Hesperus' is 'Phosphorus'" is necessarily true, if it is true, but not known a priori [Kripke] |
4966 | Theoretical identities are between rigid designators, and so are necessary a posteriori [Kripke] |
9174 | It is necessary that this table is not made of ice, but we don't know it a priori [Kripke] |
2408 | Kripke has demonstrated that some necessary truths are only knowable a posteriori [Kripke, by Chalmers] |
13967 | Kripke's essentialist necessary a posteriori opened the gap between conceivable and really possible [Soames on Kripke] |
13970 | Kripke gets to the necessary a posteriori by only allowing conceivability when combined with actuality [Kripke, by Soames] |
4943 | Instead of talking about possible worlds, we can always say "It is possible that.." [Kripke] |
4950 | Possible worlds are useful in set theory, but can be very misleading elsewhere [Kripke] |
16992 | Possible worlds aren't puzzling places to learn about, but places we ourselves describe [Kripke] |
16983 | Probability with dice uses possible worlds, abstractions which fictionally simplify things [Kripke] |
16993 | If we discuss what might have happened to Nixon, we stipulate that it is about Nixon [Kripke] |
16998 | Transworld identification is unproblematic, because we stipulate that we rigidly refer to something [Kripke] |
17001 | A table in some possible world should not even be identified by its essential properties [Kripke] |
4952 | Identification across possible worlds does not need properties, even essential ones [Kripke] |
7761 | Test for rigidity by inserting into the sentence 'N might not have been N' [Kripke, by Lycan] |
7693 | Kripke avoids difficulties of transworld identity by saying it is a decision, not a discovery [Kripke, by Jacquette] |
5821 | Saying that natural kinds are 'rigid designators' is the same as saying they are 'indexical' [Kripke, by Putnam] |
14068 | If Kripke names must still denote a thing in a non-actual situation, the statue isn't its clay [Gibbard on Kripke] |
10436 | A rigid expression may refer at a world to an object not existing in that world [Kripke, by Sainsbury] |
4953 | We do not begin with possible worlds and place objects in them; we begin with objects in the real world [Kripke] |
4961 | It is a necessary truth that Elizabeth II was the child of two particular parents [Kripke] |
9172 | A 'rigid designator' designates the same object in all possible worlds [Kripke] |
9173 | We cannot say that Nixon might have been a different man from the one he actually was [Kripke] |
17003 | Kaplan's 'Dthat' is a useful operator for transforming a description into a rigid designation [Kripke] |
9176 | Modal statements about this table never refer to counterparts; that confuses epistemology and metaphysics [Kripke] |
9221 | The best known objection to counterparts is Kripke's, that Humphrey doesn't care if his counterpart wins [Kripke, by Sider] |
16986 | That there might have been unicorns is false; we don't know the circumstances for unicorns [Kripke] |
8259 | Kripke has breathed new life into the a priori/a posteriori distinction [Kripke, by Lowe] |
16989 | Rather than 'a priori truth', it is best to stick to whether some person knows it on a priori evidence [Kripke] |
4947 | A priori truths can be known independently of experience - but they don't have to be [Kripke] |
16892 | Is apriority predicated mainly of truths and proofs, or of human cognition? [Burge] |
17052 | The a priori analytic truths involving fixing of reference are contingent [Kripke] |
13975 | Kripke was more successful in illuminating necessity than a priority (and their relations to analyticity) [Kripke, by Soames] |
17048 | Analytic judgements are a priori, even when their content is empirical [Kripke] |
4948 | Intuition is the strongest possible evidence one can have about anything [Kripke] |
9382 | Subjects may be unaware of their epistemic 'entitlements', unlike their 'justifications' [Burge] |
19737 | A system can infer the structure of the world by making predictions about it [New Sci.] |
4958 | Identities like 'heat is molecule motion' are necessary (in the highest degree), not contingent [Kripke] |
4969 | I regard the mind-body problem as wide open, and extremely confusing [Kripke] |
8126 | Anti-individualism says the environment is involved in the individuation of some mental states [Burge] |
8127 | Broad concepts suggest an extension of the mind into the environment (less computer-like) [Burge] |
19736 | Neural networks can extract the car-ness of a car, or the chair-ness of a chair [New Sci.] |
8129 | Anti-individualism may be incompatible with some sorts of self-knowledge [Burge] |
4967 | It seems logically possible to have the pain brain state without the actual pain [Kripke] |
9177 | Identity theorists must deny that pains can be imagined without brain states [Kripke] |
8131 | Some qualities of experience, like blurred vision, have no function at all [Burge] |
7430 | Kripke assumes that mind-brain identity designates rigidly, which it doesn't [Armstrong on Kripke] |
7867 | If consciousness could separate from brain, then it cannot be identical with brain [Kripke, by Papineau] |
3228 | Kripke says pain is necessarily pain, but a brain state isn't necessarily painful [Kripke, by Rey] |
5832 | Identity must be necessary, but pain isn't necessarily a brain state, so they aren't identical [Kripke, by Schwartz,SP] |
4968 | Identity theorists seem committed to no-brain-event-no-pain, and vice versa, which seems wrong [Kripke] |
9178 | Pain, unlike heat, is picked out by an essential property [Kripke] |
16419 | No one has yet devised a rationality test [New Sci.] |
16417 | About a third of variation in human intelligence is environmental [New Sci.] |
16418 | People can be highly intelligent, yet very stupid [New Sci.] |
19271 | No rule can be fully explained [Kripke] |
19269 | 'Quus' means the same as 'plus' if the ingredients are less than 57; otherwise it just produces 5 [Kripke] |
19484 | Psychologists measure personality along five dimensions [New Sci.] |
16383 | Puzzled Pierre has two mental files about the same object [Recanati on Kripke] |
3115 | Are meaning and expressed concept the same thing? [Burge, by Segal] |
7305 | Kripke's Wittgenstein says meaning 'vanishes into thin air' [Kripke, by Miller,A] |
19270 | If you ask what is in your mind for following the addition rule, meaning just seems to vanish [Kripke] |
17874 | Kripke has a definitional account of kinds, but not of naming [Almog on Kripke] |
16394 | Kripke derives accounts of reference and proper names from assumptions about worlds and essences [Stalnaker on Kripke] |
5822 | The important cause is not between dubbing and current use, but between the item and the speaker's information [Evans on Kripke] |
17033 | We may refer through a causal chain, but still change what is referred to [Kripke] |
4689 | Kripke makes reference a largely social matter, external to the mind of the speaker [Kripke, by McGinn] |
17504 | Kripke's theory is important because it gives a collective account of reference [Kripke, by Putnam] |
17035 | We refer through the community, going back to the original referent [Kripke] |
4956 | A description may fix a reference even when it is not true of its object [Kripke] |
16988 | Descriptive reference shows how to refer, how to identify two things, and how to challenge existence [Kripke, by PG] |
17029 | It can't be necessary that Aristotle had the properties commonly attributed to him [Kripke] |
17032 | Even if Gödel didn't produce his theorems, he's still called 'Gödel' [Kripke] |
11076 | Community implies assertability-conditions rather than truth-conditions semantics [Kripke, by Hanna] |
14893 | Rigid designation creates a puzzle - why do some necessary truths appear to be contingent? [Kripke, by Maciŕ/Garcia-Carpentiro] |
11075 | The sceptical rule-following paradox is the basis of the private language argument [Kripke, by Hanna] |
17056 | Terms for natural kinds are very close to proper names [Kripke] |
4963 | The properties that fix reference are contingent, the properties involving meaning are necessary [Kripke] |
17053 | Gold's atomic number might not be 79, but if it is, could non-79 stuff be gold? [Kripke] |
4964 | 'Cats are animals' has turned out to be a necessary truth [Kripke] |
6765 | Nominal essence may well be neither necessary nor sufficient for a natural kind [Kripke, by Bird] |
14349 | If there are no finks or antidotes at the fundamental level, the laws can't be ceteris paribus [Burge, by Corry] |
9387 | The scientific discovery (if correct) that gold has atomic number 79 is a necessary truth [Kripke] |
17054 | Scientific discoveries about gold are necessary truths [Kripke] |
17057 | Once we've found that heat is molecular motion, then that's what it is, in all possible worlds [Kripke] |
4965 | Science searches basic structures in search of essences [Kripke] |
21167 | Gravity is unusual, in that it always attracts and never repels [New Sci.] |
19950 | Entropy is the only time-asymmetric law, so time may be linked to entropy [New Sci.] |
21176 | In the Big Bang general relativity fails, because gravity is too powerful [New Sci.] |
21147 | Quantum electrodynamics incorporates special relativity and quantum mechanics [New Sci.] |
21155 | Photons have zero rest mass, so virtual photons have infinite range [New Sci.] |
19478 | Light moves at a constant space-time speed, but its direction is in neither space nor time [New Sci.] |
21161 | In the standard model all the fundamental force fields merge at extremely high energies [New Sci.] |
21146 | Electrons move fast, so are subject to special relativity [New Sci.] |
19474 | Quantum states are measured by external time, of unknown origin [New Sci.] |
19473 | The Schrödinger equation describes the evolution of an object's wave function in Hilbert space [New Sci.] |
21148 | The strong force is repulsive at short distances, strong at medium, and fades at long [New Sci.] |
21151 | Gluons, the particles carrying the strong force, interact because of their colour charge [New Sci.] |
21152 | The strong force binds quarks tight, and the nucleus more weakly [New Sci.] |
21143 | Quarks in threes can build hadrons with spin ˝ or with spin 3/2 [New Sci.] |
21142 | Classifying hadrons revealed two symmetry patterns, produced by three basic elements [New Sci.] |
21150 | Three different colours of quark (as in the proton) can cancel out to give no colour [New Sci.] |
21145 | The four fundamental forces (gravity, electromagnetism, weak and strong) are the effects of particles [New Sci.] |
21153 | The weak force explains beta decay, and the change of type by quarks and leptons [New Sci.] |
21154 | Three particles enable the weak force: W+ and W- are charged, and Z° is not [New Sci.] |
21156 | The weak force particles are heavy, so the force has a short range [New Sci.] |
21164 | Why do the charges of the very different proton and electron perfectly match up? [New Sci.] |
21170 | The Standard Model cannot explain dark energy, survival of matter, gravity, or force strength [New Sci.] |
21140 | Spin is a built-in ration of angular momentum [New Sci.] |
21149 | Quarks have red, green or blue colour charge (akin to electric charge) [New Sci.] |
21158 | Fermions, with spin ˝, are antisocial, and cannot share quantum states [New Sci.] |
21165 | Spin is akin to rotation, and is easily measured in a magnetic field [New Sci.] |
21157 | Particles are spread out, with wave-like properties, and higher energy shortens the wavelength [New Sci.] |
21163 | The mass of protons and neutrinos is mostly binding energy, not the quarks [New Sci.] |
21168 | Gravitional mass turns out to be the same as inertial mass [New Sci.] |
21138 | Neutrons are slightly heavier than protons, and decay into them by emitting an electron [New Sci.] |
21144 | Top, bottom, charm and strange quarks quickly decay into up and down [New Sci.] |
21141 | Neutrinos were proposed as the missing energy in neutron beta decay [New Sci.] |
21169 | Only neutrinos spin anticlockwise [New Sci.] |
21166 | Standard antineutrinos have opposite spin and opposite lepton number [New Sci.] |
21171 | The symmetry of unified electromagnetic and weak forces was broken by the Higgs field [New Sci.] |
19954 | It is impossible for find a model of actuality among the innumerable models in string theory [New Sci.] |
21178 | String theory is now part of 11-dimensional M-Theory, involving p-branes [New Sci.] |
19476 | String theory needs at least 10 space-time dimensions [New Sci.] |
21179 | Supersymmetric string theory can be expressed using loop quantum gravity [New Sci.] |
21175 | String theory might be tested by colliding strings to make bigger 'stringballs' [New Sci.] |
21177 | String theory offers a quantum theory of gravity, by describing the graviton [New Sci.] |
19953 | In string theory space-time has a grainy indivisible substructure [New Sci.] |
21162 | Only supersymmetry offers to incorporate gravity into the scheme [New Sci.] |
21159 | Supersymmetry has extra heavy bosons and heavy fermions [New Sci.] |
21173 | Supersymmetry says particles and superpartners were unities, but then split [New Sci.] |
21172 | The evidence for supersymmetry keeps failing to appear [New Sci.] |
19947 | Hilbert Space is an abstraction representing all possible states of a quantum system [New Sci.] |
21160 | The Higgs field means even low energy space is not empty [New Sci.] |
19948 | Einstein's merging of time with space has left us confused about the nature of time [New Sci.] |
19475 | Relativity makes time and space jointly basic; quantum theory splits them, and prioritises time [New Sci.] |
19955 | Space-time may be a geometrical manifestation of quantum entanglement [New Sci.] |
19949 | Quantum theory relies on a clock outside the system - but where is it located? [New Sci.] |
19951 | Entropy is puzzling, so we may need to build new laws which include time directionality [New Sci.] |
19477 | General relativity predicts black holes, as former massive stars, and as galaxy centres [New Sci.] |
19952 | Black holes have entropy, but general relativity says they are unstructured, and lack entropy [New Sci.] |
16420 | 84.5 percent of the universe is made of dark matter [New Sci.] |
21174 | Dark matter must have mass, to produce gravity, and no electric charge, to not reflect light [New Sci.] |
17604 | We are halfway to synthesising any molecule we want [New Sci.] |
17603 | Chemistry just needs the periodic table, and protons, electrons and neutrinos [New Sci.] |
17050 | Tigers may lack all the properties we originally used to identify them [Kripke] |
17051 | The original concept of 'cat' comes from paradigmatic instances [Kripke] |
17049 | 'Tiger' designates a species, and merely looking like the species is not enough [Kripke] |