78 ideas
| 7950 | Philosophy tries to explain how the actual is possible, given that it seems impossible [Macdonald,C] |
| 15801 | Many philosophers aim to understand metaphysics by studying ourselves [Chisholm] |
| 7923 | 'Did it for the sake of x' doesn't involve a sake, so how can ontological commitments be inferred? [Macdonald,C] |
| 15802 | I use variables to show that each item remains the same entity throughout [Chisholm] |
| 7933 | Don't assume that a thing has all the properties of its parts [Macdonald,C] |
| 15832 | Events are states of affairs that occur at certain places and times [Chisholm] |
| 7944 | Reduce by bridge laws (plus property identities?), by elimination, or by reducing talk [Macdonald,C] |
| 15829 | The mark of a state of affairs is that it is capable of being accepted [Chisholm] |
| 15809 | A state of affairs pertains to a thing if it implies that it has some property [Chisholm] |
| 15828 | I propose that events and propositions are two types of states of affairs [Chisholm] |
| 13120 | Chisholm divides things into contingent and necessary, and then individuals, states and non-states [Chisholm, by Westerhoff] |
| 7938 | Relational properties are clearly not essential to substances [Macdonald,C] |
| 7967 | Being taller is an external relation, but properties and substances have internal relations [Macdonald,C] |
| 15827 | Some properties, such as 'being a widow', can be seen as 'rooted outside the time they are had' [Chisholm] |
| 15830 | Some properties can never be had, like being a round square [Chisholm] |
| 15804 | If some dogs are brown, that entails the properties of 'being brown' and 'being canine' [Chisholm] |
| 7965 | Does the knowledge of each property require an infinity of accompanying knowledge? [Macdonald,C] |
| 7934 | Tropes are abstract (two can occupy the same place), but not universals (they have locations) [Macdonald,C] |
| 7958 | Properties are sets of exactly resembling property-particulars [Macdonald,C] |
| 7972 | Tropes are abstract particulars, not concrete particulars, so the theory is not nominalist [Macdonald,C] |
| 7959 | How do a group of resembling tropes all resemble one another in the same way? [Macdonald,C] |
| 7960 | Trope Nominalism is the only nominalism to introduce new entities, inviting Ockham's Razor [Macdonald,C] |
| 7951 | Numerical sameness is explained by theories of identity, but what explains qualitative identity? [Macdonald,C] |
| 7964 | How can universals connect instances, if they are nothing like them? [Macdonald,C] |
| 7971 | Real Nominalism is only committed to concrete particulars, word-tokens, and (possibly) sets [Macdonald,C] |
| 7955 | Resemblance Nominalism cannot explain either new resemblances, or absence of resemblances [Macdonald,C] |
| 15810 | Maybe we can only individuate things by relating them to ourselves [Chisholm] |
| 7961 | A 'thing' cannot be in two places at once, and two things cannot be in the same place at once [Macdonald,C] |
| 15805 | Being the tallest man is an 'individual concept', but not a haecceity [Chisholm] |
| 15807 | A haecceity is a property had necessarily, and strictly confined to one entity [Chisholm] |
| 7926 | We 'individuate' kinds of object, and 'identify' particular specimens [Macdonald,C] |
| 7936 | Unlike bundles of properties, substances have an intrinsic unity [Macdonald,C] |
| 7930 | The bundle theory of substance implies the identity of indiscernibles [Macdonald,C] |
| 7932 | A phenomenalist cannot distinguish substance from attribute, so must accept the bundle view [Macdonald,C] |
| 7937 | When we ascribe a property to a substance, the bundle theory will make that a tautology [Macdonald,C] |
| 7939 | Substances persist through change, but the bundle theory says they can't [Macdonald,C] |
| 7940 | A substance might be a sequence of bundles, rather than a single bundle [Macdonald,C] |
| 7948 | A statue and its matter have different persistence conditions, so they are not identical [Macdonald,C] |
| 15814 | A peach is sweet and fuzzy, but it doesn't 'have' those qualities [Chisholm] |
| 7929 | A substance is either a bundle of properties, or a bare substratum, or an essence [Macdonald,C] |
| 7941 | Each substance contains a non-property, which is its substratum or bare particular [Macdonald,C] |
| 7942 | The substratum theory explains the unity of substances, and their survival through change [Macdonald,C] |
| 7943 | A substratum has the quality of being bare, and they are useless because indiscernible [Macdonald,C] |
| 12852 | If x is ever part of y, then y is necessarily such that x is part of y at any time that y exists [Chisholm, by Simons] |
| 15808 | A traditional individual essence includes all of a thing's necessary characteristics [Chisholm] |
| 11966 | If there are essential properties, how do you find out what they are? [Chisholm] |
| 12851 | Intermittence is seen in a toy fort, which is dismantled then rebuilt with the same bricks [Chisholm, by Simons] |
| 15806 | The property of being identical with me is an individual concept [Chisholm] |
| 7927 | At different times Leibniz articulated three different versions of his so-called Law [Macdonald,C] |
| 7928 | The Identity of Indiscernibles is false, because it is not necessarily true [Macdonald,C] |
| 15826 | There is 'loose' identity between things if their properties, or truths about them, might differ [Chisholm] |
| 11965 | Could possible Adam gradually transform into Noah, and vice versa? [Chisholm] |
| 19569 | We have a basic epistemic duty to believe truth and avoid error [Chisholm, by Kvanvig] |
| 15819 | Do sense-data have structure, location, weight, and constituting matter? [Chisholm] |
| 15816 | 'I feel depressed' is more like 'he runs slowly' than like 'he has a red book' [Chisholm] |
| 15817 | If we can say a man senses 'redly', why not also 'rectangularly'? [Chisholm] |
| 15818 | So called 'sense-data' are best seen as 'modifications' of the person experiencing them [Chisholm] |
| 8790 | The 'doctrine of the given' is correct; some beliefs or statements are self-justifying [Chisholm] |
| 15831 | Explanations have states of affairs as their objects [Chisholm] |
| 20643 | Consilience is a common groundwork of explanation [Whewell] |
| 15811 | I am picked out uniquely by my individual essence, which is 'being identical with myself' [Chisholm] |
| 15815 | Sartre says the ego is 'opaque'; I prefer to say that it is 'transparent' [Chisholm] |
| 7947 | In continuity, what matters is not just the beginning and end states, but the process itself [Macdonald,C] |
| 15813 | People use 'I' to refer to themselves, with the meaning of their own individual essence [Chisholm] |
| 15803 | Bad theories of the self see it as abstract, or as a bundle, or as a process [Chisholm] |
| 3444 | If actions are not caused by other events, and are not causeless, they must be caused by the person [Chisholm] |
| 3446 | For Hobbes (but not for Kant) a person's actions can be deduced from their desires and beliefs [Chisholm] |
| 9268 | If free will miraculously interrupts causation, animals might do that; why would we want to do it? [Frankfurt on Chisholm] |
| 15821 | Determinism claims that every event has a sufficient causal pre-condition [Chisholm] |
| 20062 | If a desire leads to a satisfactory result by an odd route, the causal theory looks wrong [Chisholm] |
| 20054 | There has to be a brain event which is not caused by another event, but by the agent [Chisholm] |
| 3442 | Responsibility seems to conflict with events being either caused or not caused [Chisholm] |
| 3443 | Desires may rule us, but are we responsible for our desires? [Chisholm] |
| 15824 | There are mere omissions (through ignorance, perhaps), and people can 'commit an omission' [Chisholm] |
| 15822 | The concept of physical necessity is basic to both causation, and to the concept of nature [Chisholm] |
| 15823 | Some propose a distinct 'agent causation', as well as 'event causation' [Chisholm] |
| 3445 | Causation among objects relates either events or states [Chisholm] |
| 15820 | A 'law of nature' is just something which is physically necessary [Chisholm] |