47 ideas
10147 | The Axiom of Choice is consistent with the other axioms of set theory [Feferman/Feferman] |
10148 | Axiom of Choice: a set exists which chooses just one element each of any set of sets [Feferman/Feferman] |
10149 | Platonist will accept the Axiom of Choice, but others want criteria of selection or definition [Feferman/Feferman] |
10150 | The Trichotomy Principle is equivalent to the Axiom of Choice [Feferman/Feferman] |
10146 | Cantor's theories needed the Axiom of Choice, but it has led to great controversy [Feferman/Feferman] |
10158 | A structure is a 'model' when the axioms are true. So which of the structures are models? [Feferman/Feferman] |
10162 | Tarski and Vaught established the equivalence relations between first-order structures [Feferman/Feferman] |
10160 | Löwenheim-Skolem says if the sentences are countable, so is the model [Feferman/Feferman] |
10159 | Löwenheim-Skolem Theorem, and Gödel's completeness of first-order logic, the earliest model theory [Feferman/Feferman] |
10161 | If a sentence holds in every model of a theory, then it is logically derivable from the theory [Feferman/Feferman] |
10156 | 'Recursion theory' concerns what can be solved by computing machines [Feferman/Feferman] |
10155 | Both Principia Mathematica and Peano Arithmetic are undecidable [Feferman/Feferman] |
13047 | It is knowing 'why' that gives scientific understanding, not knowing 'that' [Salmon] |
13065 | Understanding is an extremely vague concept [Salmon] |
411 | If we succeed in speaking the truth, we cannot know we have done it [Xenophanes] |
412 | If God had not created honey, men would say figs are sweeter [Xenophanes] |
13054 | Correlations can provide predictions, but only causes can give explanations [Salmon] |
13067 | For the instrumentalists there are no scientific explanations [Salmon] |
13055 | Good induction needs 'total evidence' - the absence at the time of any undermining evidence [Salmon] |
13046 | Scientific explanation is not reducing the unfamiliar to the familiar [Salmon] |
13058 | Why-questions can seek evidence as well as explanation [Salmon] |
14366 | An explanation is a table of statistical information [Salmon, by Strevens] |
13064 | The three basic conceptions of scientific explanation are modal, epistemic, and ontic [Salmon] |
13050 | The 'inferential' conception is that all scientific explanations are arguments [Salmon] |
13059 | Ontic explanations can be facts, or reports of facts [Salmon] |
13049 | We must distinguish true laws because they (unlike accidental generalizations) explain things [Salmon] |
13051 | Deductive-nomological explanations will predict, and their predictions will explain [Salmon] |
13053 | A law is not enough for explanation - we need information about what makes a difference [Salmon] |
13061 | Flagpoles explain shadows, and not vice versa, because of temporal ordering [Salmon] |
17093 | Causation produces productive mechanisms; to understand the world, understand these mechanisms [Salmon] |
17492 | Salmon's interaction mechanisms needn't be regular, or involving any systems [Glennan on Salmon] |
13045 | Explanation at the quantum level will probably be by entirely new mechanisms [Salmon] |
13062 | Does an item have a function the first time it occurs? [Salmon] |
13063 | Explanations reveal the mechanisms which produce the facts [Salmon] |
16557 | Salmon's mechanisms are processes and interactions, involving marks, or conserved quantities [Salmon, by Machamer/Darden/Craver] |
13060 | Can events whose probabilities are low be explained? [Salmon] |
13056 | Statistical explanation needs relevance, not high probability [Salmon] |
13057 | Think of probabilities in terms of propensities rather than frequencies [Salmon] |
1640 | The basic Eleatic belief was that all things are one [Xenophanes, by Plato] |
8412 | A causal interaction is when two processes intersect, and correlated modifications persist afterwards [Salmon] |
8413 | Cause must come first in propagations of causal interactions, but interactions are simultaneous [Salmon] |
8411 | Instead of localised events, I take enduring and extended processes as basic to causation [Salmon] |
4784 | Salmon says processes rather than events should be basic in a theory of physical causation [Salmon, by Psillos] |
8409 | Probabilistic causal concepts are widely used in everyday life and in science [Salmon] |
3055 | Xenophanes said the essence of God was spherical and utterly inhuman [Xenophanes, by Diog. Laertius] |
408 | Ethiopian gods have black hair, and Thracian gods have red hair [Xenophanes] |
407 | Mortals believe gods are born, and have voices and clothes just like mortals [Xenophanes] |