1609 ideas
1922 | Spiritual qualities only become advantageous with the growth of wisdom [Plato] |
14179 | The finest branch of wisdom is justice and moderation in ordering states and families [Plato] |
354 | Wisdom makes virtue and true goodness possible [Plato] |
13786 | Wisdom is called 'beautiful', because it performs fine works [Plato] |
23890 | For Plato true wisdom is supernatural [Plato, by Weil] |
78 | Wisdom is scientific and intuitive knowledge of what is by nature most precious [Aristotle] |
5248 | Wisdom does not study happiness, because it is not concerned with processes [Aristotle] |
548 | Knowledge chosen for its own sake, rather than for results, is wisdom [Aristotle] |
19693 | There is practical wisdom (for action), and theoretical wisdom (for deep understanding) [Aristotle, by Whitcomb] |
11228 | Wisdom seeks explanations, causes, and reasons why things are as they are [Aristotle, by Politis] |
13780 | Good people are no different from wise ones [Plato] |
2136 | Philosophers become as divine and orderly as possible, by studying divinity and order [Plato] |
2682 | Aristotle thinks human life is not important enough to spend a whole life on it [Nagel on Aristotle] |
103 | Wise people can contemplate alone, though co-operation helps [Aristotle] |
545 | It is not much help if a doctor knows about universals but not the immediate particular [Aristotle] |
291 | Don't assume that wisdom is the automatic consequence of old age [Plato] |
3060 | Plato never mentions Democritus, and wished to burn his books [Plato, by Diog. Laertius] |
162 | Can we understand an individual soul without knowing the soul in general? [Plato] |
326 | For relaxation one can consider the world of change, instead of eternal things [Plato] |
549 | All philosophy begins from wonder, either at the physical world, or at ideas [Aristotle] |
160 | The highest ability in man is the ability to discuss unity and plurality in the nature of things [Plato] |
1642 | We must fight fiercely for knowledge, understanding and intelligence [Plato] |
315 | Philosophy is the supreme gift of the gods to mortals [Plato] |
1695 | Without extensive examination firm statements are hard, but studying the difficulties is profitable [Aristotle] |
1576 | If each of us can give some logos about parts of nature, our combined efforts can be impressive [Aristotle] |
609 | Philosophy is a kind of science that deals with principles [Aristotle] |
624 | Absolute thinking is the thinking of thinking [Aristotle] |
572 | Philosophy has different powers from dialectic, and a different life from sophistry [Aristotle] |
22171 | If only natural substances exist, science is first philosophy - but not if there is an immovable substance [Aristotle] |
2845 | Free and great-souled men do not keep asking "what is the use of it?" [Aristotle] |
21360 | Unobservant thinkers tend to dogmatise using insufficient facts [Aristotle] |
370 | Philosophy is a purification of the soul ready for the afterlife [Plato] |
11242 | Wisdom is knowledge of principles and causes [Aristotle] |
17949 | Inquiry is the cause of philosophy [Aristotle] |
12038 | Translate as 'humans all desire by nature to understand' (not as 'to know') [Aristotle, by Annas] |
23767 | The winds of the discussion should decide its destination [Plato] |
15447 | We shouldn't always follow where the argument leads! [Lewis on Plato] |
559 | Even people who go astray in their opinions have contributed something useful [Aristotle] |
125 | Is a gifted philosopher unmanly if he avoids the strife of the communal world? [Plato] |
2056 | Philosophers are always switching direction to something more interesting [Plato] |
112 | Most people are readier to submit to compulsion than to argument [Aristotle] |
22521 | Our method of inquiry is to examine the smallest parts that make up the whole [Aristotle] |
166 | A speaker should be able to divide a subject, right down to the limits of divisibility [Plato] |
12274 | Begin examination with basics, and subdivide till you can go no further [Aristotle] |
16123 | Whenever you perceive a community of things, you should also hunt out differences in the group [Plato] |
2086 | Understanding mainly involves knowing the elements, not their combinations [Plato] |
2083 | Either a syllable is its letters (making parts as knowable as whole) or it isn't (meaning it has no parts) [Plato] |
23682 | It would be absurd to be precise about the small things, but only vague about the big things [Plato] |
1645 | The desire to split everything into its parts is unpleasant and unphilosophical [Plato] |
22 | Trained minds never expect more precision than is possible [Aristotle] |
76 | The object of scientific knowledge is what is necessary [Aristotle] |
23250 | Desired responsible actions result either from rational or from irrational desire [Aristotle] |
2676 | Didactic argument starts from the principles of the subject, not from the opinions of the learner [Aristotle] |
224 | When questions are doubtful we should concentrate not on objects but on ideas of the intellect [Plato] |
243 | It is foolish to quarrel with the mind's own reasoning processes [Plato] |
11283 | There is pure deductive reasoning, and explanatory demonstration reasoning [Aristotle, by Politis] |
1570 | Human beings, alone of the animals, have logos [Aristotle] |
24047 | An account is either a definition or a demonstration [Aristotle] |
1575 | For Aristotle logos is essentially the ability to talk rationally about questions of value [Roochnik on Aristotle] |
350 | In investigation the body leads us astray, but the soul gets a clear view of the facts [Plato] |
241 | We ought to follow where the argument leads us [Plato] |
5082 | Reason grasps generalities, while the senses grasp particulars [Aristotle] |
1589 | Aristotle is the supreme optimist about the ability of logos to explain nature [Roochnik on Aristotle] |
2675 | Reasoning is a way of making statements which makes them lead on to other statements [Aristotle] |
1574 | Reasoning distinguishes what is beneficial, and hence what is right [Aristotle] |
2082 | A rational account is essentially a weaving together of things with names [Plato] |
1672 | Maybe everything could be demonstrated, if demonstration can be reciprocal or circular [Aristotle] |
623 | It is readily agreed that thinking is the most godlike of things in our experience [Aristotle] |
362 | The greatest misfortune for a person is to develop a dislike for argument [Plato] |
2801 | Intelligence which looks ahead is a natural master, while bodily strength is a natural slave [Aristotle] |
21264 | Mortals are incapable of being fully rational [Plato] |
19740 | A very hungry man cannot choose between equidistant piles of food [Aristotle] |
306 | Nothing can come to be without a cause [Plato] |
11281 | We cannot say that one thing both is and is not a man [Aristotle] |
11282 | Aristotle does not take the principle of non-contradiction for granted [Aristotle, by Politis] |
1601 | The most certain basic principle is that contradictories can't be true at the same time [Aristotle] |
23917 | Contrary statements can both be reasonable, if they are meant in two different ways [Aristotle] |
6561 | A thing cannot be both in and not-in the same thing (at a given time) [Aristotle] |
1602 | For Aristotle predication is regulated by Non-Contradiction, because underlying stability is essential [Roochnik on Aristotle] |
4333 | Contraries are by definition as far distant as possible from one another [Aristotle] |
1708 | In "Callias is just/not just/unjust", which of these are contraries? [Aristotle] |
24052 | From one thing alone we can infer its contrary [Aristotle] |
1697 | The contrary of good is bad, but the contrary of bad is either good or another evil [Aristotle] |
1684 | Two falsehoods can be contrary to one another [Aristotle] |
1698 | Both sides of contraries need not exist (as health without sickness, white without black) [Aristotle] |
608 | There is no middle ground in contradiction, but there is in contrariety [Aristotle] |
192 | Only one thing can be contrary to something [Plato] |
627 | If everything is made of opposites, are the opposed things made of opposites? [Aristotle] |
628 | Not everything is composed of opposites; what, for example, is the opposite of matter? [Aristotle] |
232 | Opposites are as unlike as possible [Plato] |
2677 | Dialectic aims to start from generally accepted opinions, and lead to a contradiction [Aristotle] |
1644 | Dialectic should only be taught to those who already philosophise well [Plato] |
5847 | It is the role of dialectic to survey syllogisms [Aristotle] |
12260 | Dialectic starts from generally accepted opinions [Aristotle] |
13778 | A dialectician is someone who knows how to ask and to answer questions [Plato] |
23891 | Two contradictories force us to find a relation which will correlate them [Plato, by Weil] |
2151 | Dialectic is the only method of inquiry which uproots the things which it takes for granted [Plato] |
2154 | The ability to take an overview is the distinguishing mark of a dialectician [Plato] |
4011 | For Plato, rationality is a vision of and love of a cosmic rational order [Plato, by Taylor,C] |
287 | Good analysis involves dividing things into appropriate forms without confusion [Plato] |
8937 | Plato's 'Parmenides' is the greatest artistic achievement of the ancient dialectic [Hegel on Plato] |
20478 | In discussion a person's opinions are shown to be in conflict, leading to calm self-criticism [Plato] |
1654 | In "Gorgias" Socrates is confident that his 'elenchus' will decide moral truth [Vlastos on Plato] |
4321 | We should test one another, by asking and answering questions [Plato] |
2093 | You must never go against what you actually believe [Plato] |
2130 | People often merely practice eristic instead of dialectic, because they don't analyse the subject-matter [Plato] |
2052 | Eristic discussion is aggressive, but dialectic aims to help one's companions in discussion [Plato] |
2674 | Competitive argument aims at refutation, fallacy, paradox, solecism or repetition [Aristotle] |
12291 | There can't be one definition of two things, or two definitions of the same thing [Aristotle] |
12292 | Definitions are easily destroyed, since they can contain very many assertions [Aristotle] |
10957 | The material element may be essential to a definition [Aristotle] |
10953 | The parts of a definition are isomorphic to the parts of the entity [Aristotle] |
10960 | If we define 'man' as 'two-footed animal', why does that make man a unity? [Aristotle] |
16125 | To reveal a nature, divide down, and strip away what it has in common with other things [Plato] |
16124 | No one wants to define 'weaving' just for the sake of weaving [Plato] |
16094 | You can't define particulars, because accounts have to be generalised [Aristotle] |
15854 | A primary element has only a name, and no logos, but complexes have an account, by weaving the names [Plato] |
12360 | Definitions need the complex features of form, and don't need to mention the category [Aristotle, by Wedin] |
8200 | Aristotelian definitions aim to give the essential properties of the thing defined [Aristotle, by Quine] |
12145 | Definitions are of what something is, and that is universal [Aristotle] |
12384 | Definition by division needs predicates, which are well ordered and thorough [Aristotle] |
12075 | An Aristotelian definition is causal [Aristotle, by Witt] |
9066 | You can define objects by progressively identifying what is the same and what is different [Aristotle] |
10944 | A definition must be of something primary [Aristotle] |
596 | Only substance [ousias] admits of definition [Aristotle] |
16107 | Sometimes parts must be mentioned in definitions of essence, and sometimes not [Aristotle] |
12272 | We describe the essence of a particular thing by means of its differentiae [Aristotle] |
12279 | The differentia indicate the qualities, but not the essence [Aristotle] |
12289 | The genera and the differentiae are part of the essence [Aristotle] |
4385 | Aristotelian definition involves first stating the genus, then the differentia of the thing [Aristotle, by Urmson] |
12355 | 'Plane' is the genus of plane figures, and 'solid' of solids, with differentiae picking out types of corner [Aristotle] |
12352 | Whiteness can only belong to man because an individual like Callias happens to be white [Aristotle] |
11383 | A definition is of the universal and of the kind [Aristotle] |
10961 | Definition by division is into genus and differentiae [Aristotle] |
12356 | If the genus is just its constitutive forms (or matter), then the definition is the account of the differentiae [Aristotle] |
17040 | If I define you, I have to use terms which are all true of other things too [Aristotle] |
12353 | Species and genera are largely irrelevant in 'Metaphysics' [Aristotle, by Wedin] |
12081 | Aristotle's definitions are not unique, but apply to a range of individuals [Aristotle, by Witt] |
12283 | In definitions the first term to be assigned ought to be the genus [Aristotle] |
12261 | Differentia are generic, and belong with genus [Aristotle] |
12263 | 'Genus' is part of the essence shared among several things [Aristotle] |
12285 | The definition is peculiar to one thing, not common to many [Aristotle] |
12382 | What it is and why it is are the same; screening defines and explains an eclipse [Aristotle] |
12080 | Essence is not all the necessary properties, since these extend beyond the definition [Aristotle, by Witt] |
11153 | A definition is an account of a what-it-was-to-be-that-thing [Aristotle] |
15770 | Some things cannot be defined, and only an analogy can be given [Aristotle] |
574 | Not everything can be proven, because that would lead to an infinite regress [Aristotle] |
22529 | Men are natural leaders (apart from the unnatural ones) [Aristotle] |
22571 | 'If each is small, so too are all' is in one way false, for the whole composed of all is not small [Aristotle] |
11034 | The differentiae of genera which are different are themselves different in kind [Aristotle] |
10913 | Truth is a matter of asserting correct combinations and separations [Aristotle] |
10914 | Simple and essential truth seems to be given, with further truth arising in thinking [Aristotle] |
10916 | Truth is either intuiting a way of being, or a putting together [Aristotle] |
21356 | Piety requires us to honour truth above our friends [Aristotle] |
251 | Truth has the supreme value, for both gods and men [Plato] |
575 | If one error is worse than another, it must be because it is further from the truth [Aristotle] |
15775 | Truth-thinking does not make it so; it being so is what makes it true [Aristotle] |
10915 | The truth or falsity of a belief will be in terms of something that is always this way not that [Aristotle] |
18367 | A true existence statement has its truth caused by the existence of the thing [Aristotle] |
1703 | It is necessary that either a sea-fight occurs tomorrow or it doesn't, though neither option is in itself necessary [Aristotle] |
13776 | Truths say of what is that it is, falsehoods say of what is that it is not [Plato] |
35 | A statement is true if all the data are in harmony with it [Aristotle] |
1704 | Statements are true according to how things actually are [Aristotle] |
586 | Falsity says that which is isn't, and that which isn't is; truth says that which is is, and that which isn't isn't [Aristotle] |
19165 | Aristotle's truth formulation concerns referring parts of sentences, not sentences as wholes [Aristotle, by Davidson] |
22272 | Aristotle's later logic had to treat 'Socrates' as 'everything that is Socrates' [Potter on Aristotle] |
9405 | Square of Opposition: not both true, or not both false; one-way implication; opposite truth-values [Aristotle] |
22271 | Aristotle was the first to use schematic letters in logic [Aristotle, by Potter] |
11060 | Aristotelian syllogisms are three-part, subject-predicate, existentially committed, with laws of thought [Aristotle, by Hanna] |
18909 | Aristotelian sentences are made up by one of four 'formative' connectors [Aristotle, by Engelbretsen] |
8080 | Aristotelian identified 256 possible syllogisms, saying that 19 are valid [Aristotle, by Devlin] |
13912 | Aristotle replaced Plato's noun-verb form with unions of pairs of terms by one of four 'copulae' [Aristotle, by Engelbretsen/Sayward] |
8071 | Aristotle listed nineteen valid syllogisms (though a few of them were wrong) [Aristotle, by Devlin] |
13819 | Aristotle's said some Fs are G or some Fs are not G, forgetting that there might be no Fs [Bostock on Aristotle] |
1668 | An axiom is a principle which must be understood if one is to learn anything [Aristotle] |
562 | Axioms are the underlying principles of everything, and who but the philosopher can assess their truth? [Aristotle] |
573 | The axioms of mathematics are part of philosophy [Aristotle] |
2145 | In mathematics certain things have to be accepted without further explanation [Plato] |
9728 | Modal Square 1: □P and ¬◊¬P are 'contraries' of □¬P and ¬◊P [Aristotle, by Fitting/Mendelsohn] |
9729 | Modal Square 2: ¬□¬P and ◊P are 'subcontraries' of ¬□P and ◊¬P [Aristotle, by Fitting/Mendelsohn] |
9730 | Modal Square 3: □P and ¬◊¬P are 'contradictories' of ¬□P and ◊¬P [Aristotle, by Fitting/Mendelsohn] |
9731 | Modal Square 4: □¬P and ¬◊P are 'contradictories' of ¬□¬P and ◊P [Aristotle, by Fitting/Mendelsohn] |
9732 | Modal Square 5: □P and ¬◊¬P are 'subalternatives' of ¬□¬P and ◊P [Aristotle, by Fitting/Mendelsohn] |
9733 | Modal Square 6: □¬P and ¬◊P are 'subalternatives' of ¬□P and ◊¬P [Aristotle, by Fitting/Mendelsohn] |
9403 | There are three different deductions for actual terms, necessary terms and possible terms [Aristotle] |
15845 | It seems absurd that seeing a person's limbs, the one is many, and yet the many are one [Plato] |
13270 | Are a part and whole one or many? Either way, what is the cause? [Aristotle] |
13282 | Aristotle relativises the notion of wholeness to different measures [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
12376 | Demonstrations by reductio assume excluded middle [Aristotle] |
11033 | Predications of predicates are predications of their subjects [Aristotle] |
12373 | Something holds universally when it is proved of an arbitrary and primitive case [Aristotle] |
11148 | Deduction is when we suppose one thing, and another necessarily follows [Aristotle] |
21593 | In talking of future sea-fights, Aristotle rejects bivalence [Aristotle, by Williamson] |
22154 | For Aristotle bivalence is a feature of reality [Aristotle, by Boulter] |
1701 | A prayer is a sentence which is neither true nor false [Aristotle] |
12363 | Everything is either asserted or denied truly [Aristotle] |
4730 | For Aristotle, the subject-predicate structure of Greek reflected a substance-accident structure of reality [Aristotle, by O'Grady] |
18896 | Aristotle places terms at opposite ends, joined by a quantified copula [Aristotle, by Sommers] |
16967 | 'Are Coriscus and Callias at home?' sounds like a single question, but it isn't [Aristotle] |
3300 | Aristotle's logic is based on the subject/predicate distinction, which leads him to substances and properties [Aristotle, by Benardete,JA] |
13790 | A name-giver might misname something, then force other names to conform to it [Plato] |
13777 | A name is a sort of tool [Plato] |
13791 | Things must be known before they are named, so it can't be the names that give us knowledge [Plato] |
13789 | Anyone who knows a thing's name also knows the thing [Plato] |
11149 | Affirming/denying sentences are universal, particular, or indeterminate [Aristotle] |
8079 | Aristotelian logic has two quantifiers of the subject ('all' and 'some') [Aristotle, by Devlin] |
13004 | Aristotle's axioms (unlike Euclid's) are assumptions awaiting proof [Aristotle, by Leibniz] |
11264 | Aporia 3: Does one science investigate all being, or does each kind of being have a science? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11265 | Aporia 4: Does metaphysics just investigate pure being, or also the characteristics of being? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11259 | How can you seek knowledge of something if you don't know it? [Plato] |
11270 | Aporia 9: Is there one principle, or one kind of principle? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11261 | Puzzles arise when reasoning seems equal on both sides [Aristotle] |
11258 | We must start with our puzzles, and progress by solving them, as they reveal the real difficulty [Aristotle] |
11271 | Aporia 10: Do perishables and imperishables have the same principle? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11262 | Aporia 1: is there one science of explanation, or many? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11263 | Aporia 2: Does one science investigate both ultimate and basic principles of being? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11266 | Aporia 5: Do other things exist besides what is perceptible by the senses? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11272 | Aporia 11: Are primary being and unity distinct, or only in the things that are? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11267 | Aporia 6: Are the basic principles of a thing the kinds to which it belongs, or its components? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11268 | Aporia 7: Is a thing's kind the most general one, or the most specific one? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11269 | Aporia 8: Are there general kinds, or merely particulars? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11276 | Aporia 15: Are the causes of things universals or particulars? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11273 | Aporia 12: Do mathematical entities exist independently, or only in objects? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11274 | Aporia 13: Are there kinds, as well as particulars and mathematical entities? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11275 | Aporia 14: Are ultimate causes of things potentialities, or must they be actual? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
13986 | Plato found antinomies in ideas, Kant in space and time, and Bradley in relations [Plato, by Ryle] |
14150 | Plato's 'Parmenides' is perhaps the best collection of antinomies ever made [Russell on Plato] |
12377 | Mathematics is concerned with forms, not with superficial properties [Aristotle] |
560 | Mathematical precision is only possible in immaterial things [Aristotle] |
9076 | Mathematics studies the domain of perceptible entities, but its subject-matter is not perceptible [Aristotle] |
8726 | Geometry can lead the mind upwards to truth and philosophy [Plato] |
9867 | It is absurd to define a circle, but not be able to recognise a real one [Plato] |
9790 | Geometry studies naturally occurring lines, but not as they occur in nature [Aristotle] |
12372 | The essence of a triangle comes from the line, mentioned in any account of triangles [Aristotle] |
10958 | Perhaps numbers are substances? [Aristotle] |
1729 | We perceive number by the denial of continuity [Aristotle] |
13273 | Pluralities divide into discontinous countables; magnitudes divide into continuous things [Aristotle] |
11044 | One is prior to two, because its existence is implied by two [Aristotle] |
22962 | Two is the least number, but there is no least magnitude, because it is always divisible [Aristotle] |
11042 | Parts of a line join at a point, so it is continuous [Aristotle] |
12074 | The one in number just is the particular [Aristotle] |
17859 | Units came about when the unequals were equalised [Aristotle] |
17844 | The unit is stipulated to be indivisible [Aristotle] |
17845 | If only rectilinear figures existed, then unity would be the triangle [Aristotle] |
12273 | Unit is the starting point of number [Aristotle] |
12369 | A unit is what is quantitatively indivisible [Aristotle] |
17861 | Two men do not make one thing, as well as themselves [Aristotle] |
646 | When we count, are we adding, or naming numbers? [Aristotle] |
13155 | If you add one to one, which one becomes two, or do they both become two? [Plato] |
9865 | Daily arithmetic counts unequal things, but pure arithmetic equalises them [Plato] |
18090 | Without infinity time has limits, magnitudes are indivisible, and numbers come to an end [Aristotle] |
22929 | Aristotle's infinity is a property of the counting process, that it has no natural limit [Aristotle, by Le Poidevin] |
13212 | Infinity is only potential, never actual [Aristotle] |
22930 | Lengths do not contain infinite parts; parts are created by acts of division [Aristotle, by Le Poidevin] |
18833 | A continuous line cannot be composed of indivisible points [Aristotle] |
17850 | Each many is just ones, and is measured by the one [Aristotle] |
11041 | Some quantities are discrete, like number, and others continuous, like lines, time and space [Aristotle] |
17851 | Number is plurality measured by unity [Aristotle] |
17843 | The idea of 'one' is the foundation of number [Aristotle] |
9793 | Mathematics studies abstracted relations, commensurability and proportion [Aristotle] |
9863 | We aim for elevated discussion of pure numbers, not attaching them to physical objects [Plato] |
9864 | In pure numbers, all ones are equal, with no internal parts [Plato] |
8727 | Geometry is not an activity, but the study of unchanging knowledge [Plato] |
10216 | We master arithmetic by knowing all the numbers in our soul [Plato] |
16150 | One is, so numbers exist, so endless numbers exist, and each one must partake of being [Plato] |
13738 | It is a simple truth that the objects of mathematics have being, of some sort [Aristotle] |
12339 | Aristotle removes ontology from mathematics, and replaces the true with the beautiful [Aristotle, by Badiou] |
9974 | Ten sheep and ten dogs are the same numerically, but it is not the same ten [Aristotle] |
9861 | The same thing is both one and an unlimited number at the same time [Plato] |
13221 | Existence is either potential or actual [Aristotle] |
568 | Some things exist as substances, others as properties of substances [Aristotle] |
12348 | There are four kinds of being: incidental, per se, potential and actual, and being as truth [Aristotle, by Wedin] |
11194 | Being is either what falls in the categories, or what makes propositions true [Aristotle, by Aquinas] |
15776 | There is only being in a certain way, and without that way there is no being [Aristotle] |
611 | Being, taken simply as being, is the domain of philosophy [Aristotle] |
11288 | Things are predicated of the basic thing, which isn't predicated of anything else [Aristotle] |
324 | Before the existence of the world there must have been being, space and becoming [Plato] |
9862 | To become rational, philosophers must rise from becoming into being [Plato] |
20364 | The apprehensions of reason remain unchanging, but reasonless sensation shows mere becoming [Plato] |
229 | The one was and is and will be and was becoming and is becoming and will become [Plato] |
11278 | What does 'that which is not' refer to? [Plato] |
1643 | If statements about non-existence are logically puzzling, so are statements about existence [Plato] |
1706 | Non-existent things aren't made to exist by thought, because their non-existence is part of the thought [Aristotle] |
11232 | Primary being ('proté ousia') exists in virtue of itself, not in relation to other things [Aristotle, by Politis] |
21818 | Being depends on the Good, which is not itself being, but superior to being [Plato] |
21821 | Plato's Parmenides has a three-part theory, of Primal One, a One-Many, and a One-and-Many [Plato, by Plotinus] |
11286 | Primary being must be more than mere indeterminate ultimate subject of predication [Politis on Aristotle] |
11234 | The three main candidates for primary being are particular, universal and essence; essence is the answer [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11279 | Primary being is either universals, or the basis of predication, or essence [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11293 | Non-primary beings lack essence, or only have a derived essence [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11297 | Primary being is both the essence, and the subject of predication [Aristotle, by Politis] |
566 | If nothing exists except individuals, how can there be a science of infinity? [Aristotle] |
16090 | Being must be understood with reference to one primary sense - the being of substance [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
570 | Nothing is added to a man's existence by saying he is 'one', or that 'he exists' [Aristotle] |
12061 | The primary subject seems to be substance, to the fullest extent [Aristotle] |
10946 | Existence requires thisness, as quantity or quality [Aristotle] |
16152 | Other types of being all depend on the being of substance [Aristotle] |
11295 | There is no being unless it is determinate and well-defined [Aristotle, by Politis] |
13735 | Aristotle discusses fundamental units of being, rather than existence questions [Aristotle, by Schaffer,J] |
5105 | The incommensurability of the diagonal always exists, and so it is not in time [Aristotle] |
1707 | Maybe necessity and non-necessity are the first principles of ontology [Aristotle] |
7022 | To be is to have a capacity, to act on other things, or to receive actions [Plato] |
2061 | The best things (gods, healthy bodies, good souls) are least liable to change [Plato] |
2060 | There seem to be two sorts of change: alteration and motion [Plato] |
16115 | Change is the implied actuality of that which exists potentially [Aristotle] |
22960 | The sophists thought a man in the Lyceum is different from that man in the marketplace [Aristotle] |
16100 | True change is in a thing's logos or its matter, not in its qualities [Aristotle] |
1700 | There are six kinds of change: generation, destruction, increase, diminution, alteration, change of place [Aristotle] |
16101 | A change in qualities is mere alteration, not true change [Aristotle] |
12133 | If the substratum persists, it is 'alteration'; if it doesn't, it is 'coming-to-be' or 'passing-away' [Aristotle] |
16118 | Nature is an active principle of change, like potentiality, but it is intrinsic to things [Aristotle] |
2063 | How can beauty have identity if it changes? [Plato] |
15768 | An actuality is usually thought to be a process [Aristotle] |
13213 | All comings-to-be are passings-away, and vice versa [Aristotle] |
17262 | Aristotle's formal and material 'becauses' [aitiai] arguably involve grounding [Aristotle, by Correia/Schnieder] |
1699 | A thing is prior to another if it implies its existence [Aristotle] |
18366 | Of interdependent things, the prior one causes the other's existence [Aristotle] |
24057 | What is prior is always potentially present in what is next in order [Aristotle] |
11154 | Prior things can exist without posterior things, but not vice versa [Aristotle] |
14503 | If a mixture does not contain measure and proportion, it is corrupted and destroyed [Plato] |
15857 | Any mixture which lacks measure and proportion doesn't even count as a mixture at all [Plato] |
7953 | Reasoning needs to cut nature accurately at the joints [Plato] |
221 | Absolute ideas, such as the Good and the Beautiful, cannot be known by us [Plato] |
6562 | Plato's reality has unchanging Parmenidean forms, and Heraclitean flux [Plato, by Fogelin] |
12095 | Knowledge of potential is universal and indefinite; of the actual it is definite and of individuals [Aristotle] |
1641 | Some alarming thinkers think that only things which you can touch exist [Plato] |
11256 | Materialists cannot explain change [Aristotle, by Politis] |
10784 | Whenever there's speech it has to be about something [Plato] |
13775 | We only succeed in cutting if we use appropriate tools, not if we approach it randomly [Plato] |
16121 | I revere anyone who can discern a single thing that encompasses many things [Plato] |
13121 | Substance,Quantity,Quality,Relation,Place,Time,Being-in-a-position,Having,Doing,Being affected [Aristotle, by Westerhoff] |
3311 | The categories (substance, quality, quantity, relation, action, passion, place, time) peter out inconsequentially [Benardete,JA on Aristotle] |
12267 | There are ten categories: essence, quantity, quality, relation, place, time, position, state, activity, passivity [Aristotle] |
12347 | The immediate divisions of that which is are genera, each with its science [Aristotle] |
11035 | There are ten basic categories for thinking about things [Aristotle] |
16116 | Aristotle derived categories as answers to basic questions about nature, size, quality, location etc. [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
16656 | The separation from here to there is not the same as the separation from there to here [Aristotle] |
21345 | Aristotle said relations are not substances, so (if they exist) they must be accidents [Aristotle, by Heil] |
21347 | If Simmias is taller than Socrates, that isn't a feature that is just in Simmias [Plato] |
14502 | Plato's idea of 'structure' tends to be mathematically expressed [Plato, by Koslicki] |
7935 | There cannot be uninstantiated properties [Aristotle, by Macdonald,C] |
12282 | An individual property has to exist (in past, present or future) [Aristotle] |
16161 | Properties are just the ways in which forms are realised at various times [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
15109 | The 'propriae' or 'necessary accidents' of a thing are separate, and derived from the essence [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
17849 | For two things to differ in some respect, they must both possess that respect [Aristotle] |
16155 | Aristotle promoted the importance of properties and objects (rather than general and particular) [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
12264 | An 'accident' is something which may possibly either belong or not belong to a thing [Aristotle] |
18910 | To seek truth, study the real connections between subjects and attributes [Aristotle] |
7686 | For Aristotle, there are only as many properties as actually exist [Aristotle, by Jacquette] |
11032 | Some things said 'of' a subject are not 'in' the subject [Aristotle] |
11038 | We call them secondary 'substances' because they reveal the primary substances [Aristotle] |
10947 | Whiteness can be explained without man, but femaleness cannot be explained without animal [Aristotle] |
16644 | The features of a thing (whether quality or quantity) are inseparable from their subjects [Aristotle] |
16739 | Four species of quality: states, capacities, affects, and forms [Aristotle, by Pasnau] |
10956 | If we only saw bronze circles, would bronze be part of the concept of a circle? [Aristotle] |
5117 | Heavy and light are defined by their tendency to move down or up [Aristotle] |
16113 | Potentiality is a principle of change, in another thing, or as another thing [Aristotle] |
16114 | Active 'dunamis' is best translated as 'power' or 'ability' (rather than 'potentiality') [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
15773 | Actualities are arranged by priority, going back to what initiates process [Aristotle] |
11387 | The main characteristic of the source of change is activity [energeia] [Aristotle, by Politis] |
16752 | Sight is the essence of the eye, fitting its definition; the eye itself is just the matter [Aristotle] |
16753 | Giving the function of a house defines its actuality [Aristotle] |
15780 | Potentiality in geometry is metaphorical [Aristotle] |
11938 | The Megarans say something is only capable of something when it is actually doing it [Aristotle] |
15766 | Megaran actualism is just scepticism about the qualities of things [Aristotle] |
15767 | Megaran actualists prevent anything from happening, by denying a capacity for it to happen! [Aristotle] |
11379 | Substance is not a universal, as the former is particular but a universal is shared [Aristotle] |
12096 | Universals are indeterminate and only known in potential, because they are general [Aristotle, by Witt] |
2142 | The plurality of beautiful things must belong to a single class, because they have a single particular character [Plato] |
153 | It takes a person to understand, by using universals, and by using reason to create a unity out of sense-impressions [Plato] |
223 | If you deny that each thing always stays the same, you destroy the possibility of discussion [Plato] |
227 | You must always mean the same thing when you utter the same name [Plato] |
1675 | Separate Forms aren't needed for logic, but universals (one holding of many) are essential [Aristotle] |
649 | The acquisition of scientific knowledge is impossible without universals [Aristotle] |
11037 | Colour must be in an individual body, or it is not embodied [Aristotle] |
12094 | No universals exist separately from particulars [Aristotle] |
211 | If admirable things have Forms, maybe everything else does as well [Plato] |
219 | If absolute ideas existed in us, they would cease to be absolute [Plato] |
154 | We would have an overpowering love of knowledge if we had a pure idea of it - as with the other Forms [Plato] |
20906 | Platonists argue for the indivisible triangle-in-itself [Plato, by Aristotle] |
17948 | Plato's Forms meant that the sophists only taught the appearance of wisdom and virtue [Plato, by Nehamas] |
3039 | When Diogenes said he could only see objects but not their forms, Plato said it was because he had eyes but no intellect [Plato, by Diog. Laertius] |
5094 | Plato's Forms are said to have no location in space [Plato, by Aristotle] |
2159 | Craftsmen making furniture refer to the form, but no one manufactures the form of furniture [Plato] |
12043 | Forms are not universals, as they don't cover every general term [Plato, by Annas] |
16151 | Plato moves from Forms to a theory of genera and principles in his later work [Plato, by Frede,M] |
16122 | Good thinkers spot forms spread through things, or included within some larger form [Plato] |
10422 | The not-beautiful is part of the beautiful, though opposed to it, and is just as real [Plato] |
12042 | Plato's Forms were seen as part of physics, rather than of metaphysics [Plato, by Annas] |
307 | Something will always be well-made if the maker keeps in mind the eternal underlying pattern [Plato] |
318 | In addition to the underlying unchanging model and a changing copy of it, there must also be a foundation of all change [Plato] |
321 | For knowledge and true opinion to be different there must be Forms; otherwise we are just stuck with sensations [Plato] |
228 | Greatness and smallness must exist, to be opposed to one another, and come into being in things [Plato] |
10948 | Forms are said to be substances to which nothing is prior [Aristotle] |
360 | We must have a prior knowledge of equality, if we see 'equal' things and realise they fall short of it [Plato] |
1607 | Diotima said the Forms are the objects of desire in philosophical discourse [Plato, by Roochnik] |
210 | It would be absurd to think there were abstract Forms for vile things like hair, mud and dirt [Plato] |
220 | The concept of a master includes the concept of a slave [Plato] |
212 | The whole idea of each Form must be found in each thing which participates in it [Plato] |
216 | If things are made alike by participating in something, that thing will be the absolute idea [Plato] |
215 | If things partake of ideas, this implies either that everything thinks, or that everything actually is thought [Plato] |
218 | Participation is not by means of similarity, so we are looking for some other method of participation [Plato] |
647 | There is a confusion because Forms are said to be universal, but also some Forms are separable and particular [Aristotle] |
17 | A Form applies to a set of particular things with the same name [Plato] |
213 | Each idea is in all its participants at once, just as daytime is a unity but in many separate places at once [Plato] |
1 | There is only one source for all beauty [Plato] |
368 | Other things are named after the Forms because they participate in them [Plato] |
304 | Beautiful things must be different from beauty itself, but beauty itself must be present in each of them [Plato] |
556 | If there is one Form for both the Form and its participants, they must have something in common [Aristotle on Plato] |
4447 | If the good is one, is it unchanged when it is in particulars, and is it then separated from itself? [Plato] |
317 | The universe is basically an intelligible and unchanging model, and a visible and changing copy of it [Plato] |
16110 | If partaking explains unity, what causes participating, and what is participating? [Aristotle] |
633 | If you accept Forms, you must accept the more powerful principle of 'participating' in them [Aristotle] |
643 | How can the Forms both be the substance of things and exist separately from them? [Aristotle] |
190 | If asked whether justice itself is just or unjust, you would have to say that it is just [Plato] |
214 | If absolute greatness and great things are seen as the same, another thing appears which makes them seem great [Plato] |
217 | Nothing can be like an absolute idea, because a third idea intervenes to make them alike (leading to a regress) [Plato] |
9483 | Forms have to be their own paradigms, which seems to fuse the paradigm and the copy [Aristotle] |
563 | If gods are like men, they are just eternal men; similarly, Forms must differ from particulars [Aristotle on Plato] |
1677 | We can forget the Forms, as they are irrelevant, and not needed in giving demonstrations [Aristotle] |
557 | A Form is a cause of things only in the way that white mixed with white is a cause [Aristotle on Plato] |
565 | The Forms cannot be changeless if they are in changing things [Aristotle on Plato] |
27 | Eternal white is no whiter than temporary white, and it is the same with goodness [Aristotle] |
12122 | Plato mistakenly thought forms were totally abstracted away from matter [Bacon on Plato] |
5574 | Plato's Forms not only do not come from the senses, but they are beyond possibility of sensing [Plato, by Kant] |
5130 | It is meaningless to speak of 'man-himself', because it has the same definition as plain 'man' [Aristotle] |
16108 | If men exist by participating in two forms (Animal and Biped), they are plural, not unities [Aristotle] |
605 | The Forms have to be potentialities, not actual knowledge or movement [Aristotle] |
618 | There is no point at all in the theory of Forms unless it contains a principle that produces movement [Aristotle] |
640 | All attempts to prove the Forms are either invalid, or prove Forms where there aren't supposed to be any [Aristotle] |
641 | Are there forms for everything, or for negations, or for destroyed things? [Aristotle] |
4470 | Aristotle is not asserting facts about the location of properties, but about their ontological status [Aristotle, by Moreland] |
645 | If two is part of three then numbers aren't Forms, because they would all be intermingled [Aristotle] |
642 | What possible contribution can the Forms make to perceptible entities? [Aristotle] |
16145 | Predications only pick out kinds of things, not things in themselves [Aristotle] |
28 | How will a vision of pure goodness make someone a better doctor? [Aristotle] |
5869 | The thesis of the Form of the Good (or of anything else) is verbal and vacuous [Aristotle] |
16154 | Aristotle gave up his earlier notion of individuals, because it relied on universals [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
16158 | Form and matter may not make up a concrete particular, because there are also accidents like weight [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
9607 | The greatest discovery in human thought is Plato's discovery of abstract objects [Brown,JR on Plato] |
16086 | Objects lacking matter are intrinsic unities [Aristotle] |
10945 | Some philosophers say that in some qualified way non-existent things 'are' [Aristotle] |
13263 | We can grasp whole things in science, because they have a mathematics and a teleology [Plato, by Koslicki] |
11247 | To know a thing is to know its primary cause or explanation [Aristotle] |
12062 | Aristotle's form improves on being non-predicable as a way to identify a 'this' [Aristotle, by Wiggins] |
13787 | Doesn't each thing have an essence, just as it has other qualities? [Plato] |
16160 | For Aristotle, things are not made individual by some essential distinguishing mark [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
12351 | Genus and species are substances, because only they reveal the primary substance [Aristotle, by Wedin] |
12280 | Genus gives the essence better than the differentiae do [Aristotle] |
16156 | Individuals within a species differ in their matter, form and motivating cause [Aristotle] |
15855 | If we see everything as separate, we can then give no account of it [Plato] |
1687 | Why are being terrestrial and a biped combined in the definition of man, but being literate and musical aren't? [Aristotle] |
13261 | Plato sees an object's structure as expressible in mathematics [Plato, by Koslicki] |
13265 | Plato was less concerned than Aristotle with the source of unity in a complex object [Plato, by Koslicki] |
17041 | Natural objects include animals and their parts, plants, and the simple elements [Aristotle] |
16163 | Aristotle says that the form is what makes an entity what it is [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
590 | Things are one numerically in matter, formally in their account, generically in predicates, and by analogy in relations [Aristotle] |
10949 | Primary things just are what-it-is-to-be-that-thing [Aristotle] |
603 | How is man a unity of animal and biped, especially if the Forms of animal and of biped exist? [Aristotle] |
17838 | Things may be naturally unified because they involve an indivisible process [Aristotle] |
17841 | The formal cause may be what unifies a substance [Aristotle] |
17840 | A unity may just be a particular, a numerically indivisible thing [Aristotle] |
13272 | Things are one to the extent that they are indivisible [Aristotle] |
15851 | Parts must belong to a created thing with a distinct form [Plato] |
17842 | Indivisibility is the cause of unity, either in movement, or in the account or thought [Aristotle] |
17860 | Things are unified by contact, mixture and position [Aristotle] |
17839 | Some things are unified by their account, which rests on a unified thought about the thing [Aristotle] |
15856 | A thing can become one or many, depending on how we talk about it [Plato] |
24058 | The substance is the cause of a thing's being [Aristotle] |
569 | If substance is the basis of reality, then philosophy aims to understand substance [Aristotle] |
615 | The Pre-Socratics were studying the principles, elements and causes of substance [Aristotle] |
1694 | Substances have no opposites, and don't come in degrees (including if the substance is a man) [Aristotle] |
16172 | Substance is not predicated of anything - but it still has something underlying it, that originates it [Aristotle] |
16623 | We only infer underlying natures by analogy, observing bronze of a statue, or wood of a bed [Aristotle] |
16091 | Is primary substance just an ultimate subject, or some aspect of a complex body? [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
11231 | 'Ousia' is 'primary being' not 'primary substance' [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11280 | Primary being is 'that which lies under', or 'particular substance' [Aristotle, by Politis] |
12076 | Substance is prior in being separate, in definition, and in knowledge [Aristotle, by Witt] |
11284 | It is wrong to translate 'ousia' as 'substance' [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11040 | A single substance can receive contrary properties [Aristotle] |
592 | The baffling question of what exists is asking about the nature of substance [Aristotle] |
599 | We may have to postulate unobservable and unknowable substances [Aristotle] |
1681 | Units are positionless substances, and points are substances with position [Aristotle] |
600 | Elements and physical objects are substances, but ideas and mathematics are not so clear [Aristotle] |
11036 | A 'primary' substance is in each subject, with species or genera as 'secondary' substances [Aristotle] |
16778 | Mature Aristotle sees organisms as the paradigm substances [Aristotle, by Pasnau] |
16084 | Is a primary substance a foundation of existence, or the last stage of understanding? [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
593 | Plato's holds that there are three substances: Forms, mathematical entities, and perceptible bodies [Plato, by Aristotle] |
16140 | Secondary substances do have subjects, so they are not ultimate in the ontology [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
10965 | In earlier Aristotle the substances were particulars, not kinds [Aristotle, by Lawson-Tancred] |
8287 | Earlier Aristotle had objects as primary substances, but later he switched to substantial form [Aristotle, by Lowe] |
12350 | Things are called 'substances' because they are subjects for everything else [Aristotle] |
11299 | Substance [ousia] is the subject of predication and cause [aitia?] of something's existence [Aristotle] |
12060 | Essence (fixed by definition) is also 'ousia', so 'ousia' is both ultimate subject, and a this-thing [Aristotle] |
10941 | A substance is what-it-is-to-be, or the universal, or the genus, or the subject of saying [Aristotle] |
595 | It is matter that turns out to be substance [ousia] [Aristotle] |
11290 | Matter is not substance, because substance needs separability and thisness [Aristotle] |
10959 | The substance is the form dwelling in the object [Aristotle] |
12093 | Substance is unified and universals are diverse, so universals are not substance [Aristotle, by Witt] |
12362 | A thing's substance is its primary cause of being [Aristotle] |
11233 | In Aristotle, 'proté ousia' is 'primary being', and 'to hupokeimenon' is 'that which lies under' (or 'substance') [Aristotle, by Politis] |
12079 | Substance is distinct being because of its unity [Aristotle, by Witt] |
607 | None of the universals can be a substance [Aristotle] |
16085 | Primary matter and form make a unity, one in potentiality, the other in actuality [Aristotle] |
10951 | The statue is not called 'stone' but 'stoney' [Aristotle] |
16174 | A nature is related to a substance as shapeless matter is to something which has a shape [Aristotle] |
16096 | Statues depend on their bronze, but bronze doesn't depend on statues [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
17043 | Form, not matter, is a thing's nature, because it is actual, rather than potential [Aristotle] |
13276 | The unmoved mover and the soul show Aristotelian form as the ultimate mereological atom [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
24040 | Scientists explain anger by the matter, dialecticians by the form and the account [Aristotle] |
12345 | In 'Metaphysics' Z substantial primacy (as form) is explanatory rather than ontological [Aristotle, by Wedin] |
16147 | In 'Metaphysics' substantial forms take over from objects as primary [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
16164 | Forms of sensible substances include unrealised possibilities, so are not fully actual [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
11285 | The form of a thing is its essence and its primary being [Aristotle] |
24055 | Matter is potential, form is actual [Aristotle] |
12071 | Essences are not properties (since those can't cause individual substances) [Aristotle, by Witt] |
11251 | Plato says changing things have no essence; Aristotle disagrees [Aristotle, by Politis] |
12084 | Essential form is neither accidental nor necessary to matter, so it appears not to be a property [Aristotle, by Witt] |
16119 | Aristotle's cosmos is ordered by form, and disordered by matter [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
16148 | Aristotle moved from realism to nominalism about substances [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
16112 | A substance is a proper subject because the matter is a property of the form, not vice versa [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
12002 | Aristotle doesn't think essential properties are those which must belong to a thing [Aristotle, by Kung] |
16095 | Some forms, such as the Prime Mover, are held by Aristotle to exist without matter [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
15853 | A true substance is constituted by some nature, which is a principle [Aristotle] |
16970 | A thing's form and purpose are often the same, and form can be the initiator of change too [Aristotle] |
16104 | Unity of the form is just unity of the definition [Aristotle] |
13277 | The 'form' is the recipe for building wholes of a particular kind [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
16109 | Things are a unity because there is no clash between potential matter and actual shape/form [Aristotle] |
16088 | Aristotle's solution to the problem of unity is that form is an active cause or potentiality or nature [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
11255 | In feature-generation the matter (such as bronze) endures, but in generation it doesn't [Aristotle, by Politis] |
12134 | Matter is the substratum, which supports both coming-to-be and alteration [Aristotle] |
12301 | Every distinct thing has matter, as long as it isn't an essence or a Form [Aristotle] |
16092 | In Aristotle, bronze only becomes 'matter' when it is potentially a statue [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
12300 | Aristotle's conception of matter applies to non-physical objects as well as physical objects [Aristotle, by Fine,K] |
12077 | Aristotle's matter is something that could be the inner origin of a natural being's behaviour [Aristotle, by Witt] |
12103 | Matter is secondary, because it is potential, determined by the actuality of form [Aristotle, by Witt] |
15846 | In Parmenides, if composition is identity, a whole is nothing more than its parts [Plato, by Harte,V] |
374 | If one object is divided into its parts, someone can then say that one are many and many is one [Plato] |
597 | Is there a house over and above its bricks? [Aristotle] |
16142 | A substrate is either a 'this' supporting qualities, or 'matter' supporting actuality [Aristotle] |
16103 | A subject can't be nothing, so it must qualify as separate, and as having a distinct identity [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
10942 | If you extract all features of the object, what is left over? [Aristotle] |
16575 | Something must pre-exist any new production [Aristotle] |
10962 | It is unclear whether Aristotle believes in a propertyless subject, his 'ultimate matter' [Aristotle, by Lawson-Tancred] |
13274 | The contents of an explanatory formula are parts of the whole [Aristotle] |
2084 | If a word has no parts and has a single identity, it turns out to be the same kind of thing as a letter [Plato] |
15849 | Plato says only a one has parts, and a many does not [Plato, by Harte,V] |
15850 | Anything which has parts must be one thing, and parts are of a one, not of a many [Plato] |
15852 | A 'whole' (rather than a mere 'sum') requires an internal order which distinguishes it [Aristotle] |
15840 | If a syllable is more than its elements, is the extra bit also an element? [Aristotle] |
15843 | The whole can't be the parts, because it would be all of the parts, which is the whole [Plato] |
13260 | Plato says wholes are either containers, or they're atomic, or they don't exist [Plato, by Koslicki] |
13259 | It seems that the One must be composed of parts, which contradicts its being one [Plato] |
9071 | We first sense whole entities, and then move to particular parts of it [Aristotle] |
16791 | There is no whole except for the parts [Aristotle] |
16136 | A syllable is something different from its component vowels and consonants [Aristotle] |
22525 | The whole is prior to its parts, because parts are defined by their role [Aristotle] |
13269 | In the case of a house the parts can exist without the whole, so parts are not the whole [Aristotle] |
12878 | Wholes are continuous, rigid, uniform, similar, same kind, similar matter [Aristotle, by Simons] |
15844 | A sum is that from which nothing is lacking, which is a whole [Plato] |
11199 | Aristotelian essence underlies behaviour, or underlies definition, or is the source of existence [Aristotle, by Aquinas] |
12304 | Aristotelian essence is retained with identity through change, and bases our scientific knowledge [Aristotle, by Copi] |
11294 | Aristotle says changing, material things (and not just universals) have an essence [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11298 | Are essences actually universals? [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11237 | Only universals have essence [Plato, by Politis] |
12099 | Aristotelian essences are causal, not classificatory [Aristotle, by Witt] |
17846 | The essence of a single thing is the essence of a particular [Aristotle] |
13774 | Things don't have every attribute, and essence isn't private, so each thing has an essence [Plato] |
11039 | A primary substance reveals a 'this', which is an individual unit [Aristotle] |
12311 | Particulars are not definable, because they fluctuate [Aristotle] |
12070 | Individual essences are not universals, since those can't be substances, or cause them [Aristotle, by Witt] |
12069 | Essence is the cause of individual substance, and creates its unity [Aristotle, by Witt] |
12088 | Aristotelian essence is not universal properties, but individual essence [Aristotle, by Witt] |
11998 | Aristotle does not accept individual essences; essential properties are always general [Aristotle, by Kung] |
12083 | Aristotle's essence explains the existence of an individual substance, not its properties [Aristotle, by Witt] |
11382 | Aristotle takes essence and form as a particular, not (as some claim) as a universal, the species [Aristotle, by Politis] |
16097 | To be a subject a thing must be specifiable, with some essential properties [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
12284 | Everything that is has one single essence [Aristotle] |
11292 | Things have an essence if their explanation is a definition [Aristotle] |
11287 | Essence is what is stated in the definition [Aristotle, by Politis] |
12091 | If definition is of universals, many individuals have no definition, and hence no essence [Aristotle, by Witt] |
10963 | A thing's essence is what is mentioned in its definition [Aristotle, by Lawson-Tancred] |
12146 | Definitions recognise essences, so are not themselves essences [Aristotle] |
21259 | To grasp a thing we need its name, its definition, and what it really is [Plato] |
11188 | The Aristotelian view is that the essential properties are those that sort an object [Aristotle, by Marcus (Barcan)] |
11238 | Plato and Aristotle take essence to make a thing what it is [Plato, by Politis] |
11291 | A thing's essence is its intrinsic nature [Aristotle] |
12098 | An essence causes both its own unity and its kind [Aristotle] |
10964 | Having an essence is the criterion of being a substance [Aristotle, by Lawson-Tancred] |
12262 | An 'idion' belongs uniquely to a thing, but is not part of its essence [Aristotle] |
17039 | The predicates of a thing's nature are necessary to it [Aristotle] |
15107 | Aristotle doesn't see essential truths or essential properties as necessary [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
16972 | The four explanations are the main aspects of a thing's nature [Aristotle, by Moravcsik] |
5084 | A thing's nature is what causes its changes and stability [Aristotle] |
12361 | Primary substances are ontological in 'Categories', and explanatory in 'Metaphysics' [Aristotle, by Wedin] |
11994 | Aristotelian essences are properties mentioned at the starting point of a science [Aristotle, by Kung] |
11244 | Metaphysics is the science of ultimate explanation, or of pure existence, or of primary existence [Aristotle, by Politis] |
16143 | It is absurd that a this and a substance should be composed of a quality [Aristotle] |
16149 | Generic terms like 'man' are not substances, but qualities, relations, modes or some such thing [Aristotle] |
16106 | Generalities like man and horse are not substances, but universal composites of account and matter [Aristotle] |
16144 | Genera are not substances, and do not exist apart from the ingredient species [Aristotle] |
12359 | 'Categories' answers 'what?' with species, genus, differerentia; 'Met.' Z.17 seeks causal essence [Aristotle, by Wedin] |
12068 | Standardly, Aristotelian essences are taken to be universals of the species [Aristotle, by Witt] |
16141 | In 'Met.' he says genera can't be substances or qualities, so aren't in the ontology [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
16508 | Things are more unified if the unity comes from their own nature, not from external force [Aristotle] |
16117 | The hallmark of an artefact is that its active source of maintenance is external [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
12092 | Aristotle claims that the individual is epistemologically prior to the universal [Aristotle, by Witt] |
12090 | Actual knowledge is of the individual, and potential knowledge of the universal [Aristotle, by Witt] |
13772 | Is the being or essence of each thing private to each person? [Plato] |
16173 | Coming to be is by shape-change, addition, subtraction, composition or alteration [Aristotle] |
17042 | Natural things are their own source of stability through change [Aristotle] |
16159 | For animate things, only the form, not the matter or properties, must persist through change [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
16691 | A day, or the games, has one thing after another, actually and potentially occurring [Aristotle] |
16516 | The ship which Theseus took to Crete is now sent to Delos crowned with flowers [Plato] |
16574 | Coming-to-be may be from nothing in a qualified way, as arising from an absence [Aristotle] |
16572 | Does the pure 'this' come to be, or the 'this-such', or 'so-great', or 'somewhere'? [Aristotle] |
16573 | Philosophers have worried about coming-to-be from nothing pre-existing [Aristotle] |
13214 | The substratum changing to a contrary is the material cause of coming-to-be [Aristotle] |
13215 | If a perceptible substratum persists, it is 'alteration'; coming-to-be is a complete change [Aristotle] |
12290 | Destruction is dissolution of essence [Aristotle] |
12286 | If two things are the same, they must have the same source and origin [Aristotle] |
11378 | How a thing is generated does not explain its essence [Aristotle, by Politis] |
12101 | Aristotle wants definition, not identity, so origin is not essential to him [Aristotle, by Witt] |
11380 | Two things with the same primary being and essence are one thing [Aristotle] |
17848 | Things such as two different quadrangles are alike but not wholly the same [Aristotle] |
3315 | Aristotle denigrates the category of relation, but for modern absolutists self-relation is basic [Benardete,JA on Aristotle] |
16134 | We can't understand self-identity without a prior grasp of the object [Aristotle] |
17847 | You are one with yourself in form and matter [Aristotle] |
15847 | Two things relate either as same or different, or part of a whole, or the whole of the part [Plato] |
13788 | If we made a perfect duplicate of Cratylus, there would be two Cratyluses [Plato] |
11840 | Only if two things are identical do they have the same attributes [Aristotle] |
12266 | 'Same' is mainly for names or definitions, but also for propria, and for accidents [Aristotle] |
12287 | Two identical things have the same accidents, they are the same; if the accidents differ, they're different [Aristotle] |
12288 | Numerical sameness and generic sameness are not the same [Aristotle] |
12381 | What is necessary cannot be otherwise [Aristotle] |
12611 | Necessity makes alternatives impossible [Aristotle] |
1690 | A stone travels upwards by a forced necessity, and downwards by natural necessity [Aristotle] |
14641 | A deduction is necessary if the major (but not the minor) premise is also necessary [Aristotle] |
12259 | Reasoning is when some results follow necessarily from certain claims [Aristotle] |
17852 | A thing has a feature necessarily if its denial brings a contradiction [Aristotle] |
22518 | The actual must be possible, because it occurred [Aristotle] |
15779 | Possibility is when the necessity of the contrary is false [Aristotle] |
15769 | Anything which is possible either exists or will come into existence [Aristotle] |
15774 | We recognise potentiality from actuality [Aristotle] |
11254 | Matter is potentiality [Aristotle, by Politis] |
14544 | Potentialities are always for action, but are conditional on circumstances [Aristotle] |
15777 | A 'potentiality' is a principle of change or process in a thing [Aristotle] |
15778 | Things are destroyed not by their powers, but by their lack of them [Aristotle] |
13108 | Chance is a coincidental cause among events involving purpose and choice [Aristotle] |
13110 | Intrinsic cause is prior to coincidence, so nature and intelligence are primary causes, chance secondary [Aristotle] |
13106 | Maybe there is no pure chance; a man's choices cause his chance meetings [Aristotle] |
22505 | The two right angles of a triangle necessitate that a quadrilateral has four [Aristotle] |
12612 | Some things have external causes of their necessity; others (the simple) generate necessities [Aristotle] |
15108 | Aristotle's says necessary truths are distinct and derive from essential truths [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
2080 | Things are only knowable if a rational account (logos) is possible [Plato] |
16120 | Knowing how to achieve immortality is pointless without the knowledge how to use immortality [Plato] |
12072 | For Aristotle knowledge is explanatory, involving understanding, and principles or causes [Aristotle, by Witt] |
12073 | 'Episteme' means grasping causes, universal judgments, explanation, and teaching [Aristotle, by Witt] |
12378 | The reason why is the key to knowledge [Aristotle] |
547 | The ability to teach is a mark of true knowledge [Aristotle] |
5991 | For Aristotle, knowledge is of causes, and is theoretical, practical or productive [Aristotle, by Code] |
2133 | Knowledge must be of the permanent unchanging nature of things [Plato] |
22587 | Understanding is the aim of our nature [Aristotle] |
12366 | We only understand something when we know its explanation [Aristotle] |
16126 | Expertise is knowledge of the whole by means of the parts [Plato] |
22513 | Knowing is having knowledge; understanding is using knowledge [Aristotle] |
12364 | We understand a thing when we know its explanation and its necessity [Aristotle] |
12370 | Some understanding, of immediate items, is indemonstrable [Aristotle] |
20219 | True opinions only become really valuable when they are tied down by reasons [Plato] |
20184 | The only real evil is loss of knowledge [Plato] |
20185 | The most important things in life are wisdom and knowledge [Plato] |
2050 | It is impossible to believe something which is held to be false [Plato] |
1685 | No one has mere belief about something if they think it HAS to be true [Aristotle] |
4391 | Opinion is praised for being in accordance with truth [Aristotle] |
2076 | How can a belief exist if its object doesn't exist? [Plato] |
544 | Experience knows particulars, but only skill knows universals [Aristotle] |
10950 | Things are produced from skill if the form of them is in the mind [Aristotle] |
546 | It takes skill to know causes, not experience [Aristotle] |
1673 | Knowledge proceeds from principles, so it is hard to know if we know [Aristotle] |
389 | How can you be certain about aspects of the world if they aren't constant? [Plato] |
2573 | To perceive or think is to be conscious of our existence [Aristotle] |
11239 | The notion of a priori truth is absent in Aristotle [Aristotle, by Politis] |
357 | People are obviously recollecting when they react to a geometrical diagram [Plato] |
5985 | Seeking and learning are just recollection [Plato] |
5986 | The slave boy learns geometry from questioning, not teaching, so it is recollection [Plato] |
5961 | The soul gets its goodness from god, and its evil from previous existence. [Plato] |
359 | If we feel the inadequacy of a resemblance, we must recollect the original [Plato] |
5051 | The intellect has potential to think, like a tablet on which nothing has yet been written [Aristotle] |
9343 | To achieve pure knowledge, we must get rid of the body and contemplate things with the soul [Plato] |
1724 | Perception necessitates pleasure and pain, which necessitates appetite [Aristotle] |
17711 | Our minds take on the form of what is being perceived [Aristotle, by Mares] |
16723 | Perception of sensible objects is virtually never wrong [Aristotle] |
12379 | You cannot understand anything through perception [Aristotle] |
1725 | Why can't we sense the senses? And why do senses need stimuli? [Aristotle] |
1730 | Why do we have many senses, and not just one? [Aristotle] |
2045 | Perception is infallible, suggesting that it is knowledge [Plato] |
2067 | Our senses could have been separate, but they converge on one mind [Plato] |
1732 | Sense organs aren't the end of sensation, or they would know what does the sensing [Aristotle] |
16717 | Which of the contrary features of a body are basic to it? [Aristotle] |
1728 | Many objects of sensation are common to all the senses [Aristotle] |
1727 | Some objects of sensation are unique to one sense, where deception is impossible [Aristotle] |
16725 | Some knowledge is lost if you lose a sense, and there is no way the knowledge can be replaced [Aristotle] |
1734 | In moral thought images are essential, to be pursued or avoided [Aristotle] |
5220 | Particular facts (such as 'is it cooked?') are matters of sense-perception, not deliberation [Aristotle] |
2162 | If theory and practice conflict, the best part of the mind accepts theory, so the other part is of lower grade [Plato] |
334 | Only bird-brained people think astronomy is entirely a matter of evidence [Plato] |
1726 | We may think when we wish, but not perceive, because universals are within the mind [Aristotle] |
23312 | Aristotle is a rationalist, but reason is slowly acquired through perception and experience [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
2069 | Thought must grasp being itself before truth becomes possible [Plato] |
2078 | You might mistake eleven for twelve in your senses, but not in your mind [Plato] |
151 | True knowledge is of the reality behind sense experience [Plato] |
1637 | A soul without understanding is ugly [Plato] |
2068 | With what physical faculty do we perceive pairs of opposed abstract qualities? [Plato] |
543 | All men long to understand, as shown by their delight in the senses [Aristotle] |
1693 | Animals may have some knowledge if they retain perception, but understanding requires reasons to be given [Aristotle] |
23309 | Aristotle's concepts of understanding and explanation mean he is not a pure empiricist [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
22141 | It is enough if we refute the objections and leave common opinions undisturbed [Aristotle] |
95 | If everyone believes it, it is true [Aristotle] |
79 | Intuition grasps the definitions that can't be proved [Aristotle] |
16111 | Aristotle wants to fit common intuitions, and therefore uses language as a guide [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
9067 | Many memories of the same item form a single experience [Aristotle] |
1923 | As a guide to action, true opinion is as good as knowledge [Plato] |
174 | True opinion without reason is midway between wisdom and ignorance [Plato] |
2089 | An inadequate rational account would still not justify knowledge [Plato] |
8331 | To know something we need understanding, which is grasp of the primary cause [Aristotle] |
2140 | True belief without knowledge is like blind people on the right road [Plato] |
2085 | Parts and wholes are either equally knowable or equally unknowable [Plato] |
2091 | Without distinguishing marks, how do I know what my beliefs are about? [Plato] |
1671 | Sceptics say justification is an infinite regress, or it stops at the unknowable [Aristotle] |
2087 | A rational account might be seeing an image of one's belief, like a reflection in a mirror [Plato] |
2090 | A rational account involves giving an image, or analysis, or giving a differentiating mark [Plato] |
2081 | Maybe primary elements can be named, but not receive a rational account [Plato] |
1670 | When you understand basics, you can't be persuaded to change your mind [Aristotle] |
583 | The starting point of a proof is not a proof [Aristotle] |
2088 | A rational account of a wagon would mean knowledge of its hundred parts [Plato] |
303 | Say how many teeth the other has, then count them. If you are right, we will trust your other claims [Plato] |
13792 | There can't be any knowledge if things are constantly changing [Plato] |
2047 | What evidence can be brought to show whether we are dreaming or not? [Plato] |
581 | Dreams aren't a serious problem. No one starts walking round Athens next morning, having dreamt that they were there! [Aristotle] |
1919 | You don't need to learn what you know, and how do you seek for what you don't know? [Plato] |
585 | If relativism is individual, how can something look sweet and not taste it, or look different to our two eyes? [Aristotle] |
584 | If truth is relative it is relational, and concerns appearances relative to a situation [Aristotle] |
335 | Do the gods also hold different opinions about what is right and honourable? [Plato] |
2053 | If you claim that all beliefs are true, that includes beliefs opposed to your own [Plato] |
2054 | Clearly some people are superior to others when it comes to medicine [Plato] |
2059 | How can a relativist form opinions about what will happen in the future? [Plato] |
576 | If the majority had diseased taste, and only a few were healthy, relativists would have to prefer the former [Aristotle] |
12371 | A demonstration is a deduction which proceeds from necessities [Aristotle] |
1691 | Aim to get definitions of the primitive components, thus establishing the kind, and work towards the attributes [Aristotle] |
24048 | Demonstrations move from starting-points to deduced conclusions [Aristotle] |
12147 | The principles of demonstrations are definitions [Aristotle] |
16647 | Demonstration starts from a definition of essence, so we can derive (or conjecture about) the properties [Aristotle] |
24068 | Demonstration is more than entailment, as the explanatory order must match the causal order [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
17310 | Aristotle gets asymmetric consequence from demonstration, which reflects real causal priority [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
21359 | Aristotle doesn't actually apply his theory of demonstration to his practical science [Leroi on Aristotle] |
12365 | We can know by demonstration, which is a scientific deduction leading to understanding [Aristotle] |
1667 | Premises must be true, primitive and immediate, and prior to and explanatory of conclusions [Aristotle] |
10918 | Demonstrative understanding rests on necessary features of the thing in itself [Aristotle] |
12374 | Demonstrations must be necessary, and that depends on the middle term [Aristotle] |
12148 | Demonstrations are syllogisms which give explanations [Aristotle] |
12383 | There must be definitions before demonstration is possible [Aristotle] |
12309 | There cannot be a science of accidentals, but only of general truths [Aristotle] |
11386 | Demonstrations about particulars must be about everything of that type [Aristotle] |
1680 | Demonstration is better with fewer presuppositions, and it is quicker if these are familiar [Aristotle] |
1674 | All demonstration is concerned with existence, axioms and properties [Aristotle] |
1679 | Universal demonstrations are about thought; particular demonstrations lead to perceptions [Aristotle] |
165 | If the apparent facts strongly conflict with probability, it is in everyone's interests to suppress the facts [Plato] |
5862 | A single counterexample is enough to prove that a truth is not necessary [Aristotle] |
16971 | Plato says sciences are unified around Forms; Aristotle says they're unified around substance [Aristotle, by Moravcsik] |
5854 | Nobody fears a disease which nobody has yet caught [Aristotle] |
12271 | Induction is the progress from particulars to universals [Aristotle] |
1683 | We learn universals from many particulars [Aristotle] |
12293 | We say 'so in cases of this kind', but how do you decide what is 'of this kind'? [Aristotle] |
11243 | Aristotelian explanations are facts, while modern explanations depend on human conceptions [Aristotle, by Politis] |
12385 | Are particulars explained more by universals, or by other particulars? [Aristotle] |
11385 | Universal principles are not primary beings, but particular principles are not universally knowable [Aristotle] |
12380 | Universals are valuable because they make the explanations plain [Aristotle] |
12367 | What is most universal is furthest away, and the particulars are nearest [Aristotle] |
17085 | A good explanation totally rules out the opposite explanation (so Forms are required) [Plato, by Ruben] |
1686 | What we seek and understand are facts, reasons, existence, and identity [Aristotle] |
5080 | We know a thing if we grasp its first causes, principles and basic elements [Aristotle] |
1689 | Explanation is of the status of a thing, inferences to it, initiation of change, and purpose [Aristotle] |
11289 | Understanding moves from the less to the more intelligible [Aristotle] |
16969 | Science refers the question Why? to four causes/explanations: matter, form, source, purpose [Aristotle] |
11250 | Four Explanations: the essence and form; the matter; the source; and the end [Aristotle, by Politis] |
12045 | Aristotle's four 'causes' are four items which figure in basic explanations of nature [Aristotle, by Annas] |
16968 | There are as many causes/explanations as there are different types of why-question [Aristotle] |
11246 | Aristotelian explanations mainly divide things into natural kinds [Aristotle, by Politis] |
3320 | Aristotle's standard analysis of species and genus involves specifying things in terms of something more general [Aristotle, by Benardete,JA] |
12357 | Explanation and generality are inseparable [Aristotle, by Wedin] |
13109 | Chance is inexplicable, because we can only explain what happens always or usually [Aristotle] |
22522 | To grasp something, trace it back to its natural origins [Aristotle] |
15859 | To investigate the causes of things, study what is best for them [Plato] |
1669 | The foundation or source is stronger than the thing it causes [Aristotle] |
15119 | Aristotelian explanation by essence may need to draw on knowledge of other essences [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
22524 | The nature of each thing is its mature state [Aristotle] |
12000 | Aristotle regularly says that essential properties explain other significant properties [Aristotle, by Kung] |
16646 | To understand a triangle summing to two right angles, we need to know the essence of a line [Aristotle] |
16135 | Real enquiries seek causes, and causes are essences [Aristotle] |
11384 | We know something when we fully know what it is, not just its quality, quantity or location [Aristotle] |
16105 | We know a thing when we grasp its essence [Aristotle] |
11296 | The explanation is what gives matter its state, which is the form, which is the substance [Aristotle] |
11999 | Essential properties explain in conjunction with properties shared by the same kind [Aristotle, by Kung] |
1678 | Universals give better explanations, because they are self-explanatory and primitive [Aristotle] |
1714 | Mind involves movement, perception, incorporeality [Aristotle] |
2096 | Is the function of the mind management, authority and planning - or is it one's whole way of life? [Plato] |
13781 | Soul causes the body to live, and gives it power to breathe and to be revitalized [Plato] |
6009 | Psychic conflict is clear if appetite is close to the body and reason fairly separate [Plato, by Modrak] |
6041 | There is a third element to the mind - spirit - lying between reason and appetite [Plato] |
9296 | The soul is self-motion [Plato] |
5962 | Plato says the soul is ordered by number [Plato, by Plutarch] |
21260 | Soul is what is defined by 'self-generating motion' [Plato] |
5146 | Everything that receives nourishment has a vegetative soul, with it own distinctive excellence [Aristotle] |
5147 | In a controlled person the receptive part of the soul is obedient, and it is in harmony in the virtuous [Aristotle] |
5148 | The irrational psuché is persuadable by reason - shown by our criticism and encouragement of people [Aristotle] |
5232 | If beings are dominated by appetite, this can increase so much that it drives out reason [Aristotle] |
5507 | Aristotle led to the view that there are several souls, all somewhat physical [Aristotle, by Martin/Barresi] |
24051 | Soul is seen as what moves, or what is least physical, or a combination of elements [Aristotle] |
12086 | Psuché is the form and actuality of a body which potentially has life [Aristotle] |
16754 | The soul is the cause or source of movement, the essence of body, and its end [Aristotle] |
24046 | Understanding is impossible, if it involves the understanding having parts [Aristotle] |
2127 | The mind has parts, because we have inner conflicts [Plato] |
1737 | The soul seems to have an infinity of parts [Aristotle on Plato] |
5145 | The rational and irrational parts of the soul are either truly separate, or merely described that way [Aristotle] |
1717 | If the soul is composed of many physical parts, it can't be a true unity [Aristotle] |
24053 | If a soul have parts, what unites them? [Aristotle] |
1721 | What unifies the soul would have to be a super-soul, which seems absurd [Aristotle] |
1735 | In a way the soul is everything which exists, through its perceptions and thoughts [Aristotle] |
23218 | The brain has no responsibility for sensations, which occur in the heart [Aristotle] |
13154 | Do we think and experience with blood, air or fire, or could it be our brain? [Plato] |
24061 | If we divide the mind up according to its capacities, there are a lot of them [Aristotle] |
23906 | Courage from spirit is natural and unconquerable, as seen in the young [Aristotle] |
20204 | Whether the mind has parts is irrelevant, since it obviously has distinct capacities [Aristotle] |
24062 | Self-moving animals must have desires, and that entails having imagination [Aristotle] |
18911 | Linguistic terms form a hierarchy, with higher terms predicable of increasing numbers of things [Aristotle, by Engelbretsen] |
9068 | Perception creates primitive immediate principles by building a series of firm concepts [Aristotle] |
9069 | A perception lodging in the soul creates a primitive universal, which becomes generalised [Aristotle] |
9088 | Skill comes from a general assumption obtained from thinking about similar things [Aristotle] |
16153 | Aristotle distinguishes two different sorts of generality - kinds, and properties [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
9791 | Science is more accurate when it is prior and simpler, especially without magnitude or movement [Aristotle] |
191 | Everything resembles everything else up to a point [Plato] |
276 | My individuality is my soul, which carries my body around [Plato] |
22528 | The nature of all animate things is to have one part which rules it [Aristotle] |
571 | Is Socrates the same person when standing and when seated? [Aristotle] |
364 | One soul can't be more or less of a soul than another [Plato] |
5266 | It would seem that the thinking part is the individual self [Aristotle] |
180 | We call a person the same throughout life, but all their attributes change [Plato] |
181 | Only the gods stay unchanged; we replace our losses with similar acquisitions [Plato] |
8007 | Aristotle never discusses free will [Aristotle, by MacIntyre] |
12961 | For an action to be 'free', it must be deliberate as well as unconstrained [Aristotle, by Leibniz] |
4118 | A human being fathers his own actions as he fathers his children [Aristotle] |
22506 | A man is the cause of what is within his power, and what he causes is in his power [Aristotle] |
22504 | Only a human being can be a starting point for an action [Aristotle] |
20192 | Aristotle assesses whether people are responsible, and if they are it was voluntary [Aristotle, by Zagzebski] |
330 | No one wants to be bad, but bad men result from physical and educational failures, which they do not want or choose [Plato] |
1710 | Emotion involves the body, thinking uses the mind, imagination hovers between them [Aristotle] |
24039 | All the emotions seem to involve the body, simultaneously with the feeling [Aristotle] |
24056 | The soul (or parts of it) is not separable from the body [Aristotle] |
24050 | If soul is separate from body, why does it die when the body dies? [Aristotle] |
24049 | Thinkers place the soul within the body, but never explain how they are attached [Aristotle] |
1514 | Early thinkers concentrate on the soul but ignore the body, as if it didn't matter what body received the soul [Aristotle] |
2683 | Aristotle has a problem fitting his separate reason into the soul, which is said to be the form of the body [Ackrill on Aristotle] |
1718 | Does the mind think or pity, or does the whole man do these things? [Aristotle] |
13275 | The soul and the body are inseparable, like the imprint in some wax [Aristotle] |
1733 | Thinking is not perceiving, but takes the form of imagination and speculation [Aristotle] |
4405 | The attainment of truth is the task of the intellectual part of the soul [Aristotle] |
22510 | Some emotional states are too strong for human nature [Aristotle] |
23997 | Plato saw emotions and appetites as wild horses, in need of taming [Plato, by Goldie] |
1651 | Plato wanted to somehow control and purify the passions [Vlastos on Plato] |
5160 | There is a mean of feelings, as in our responses to the good or bad fortune of others [Aristotle] |
23913 | Nearly all the good and bad states of character are concerned with feelings [Aristotle] |
4326 | Aristotle gives a superior account of rationality, because he allows emotions to participate [Hursthouse on Aristotle] |
72 | Assume our reason is in two parts, one for permanent first principles, and one for variable things [Aristotle] |
23307 | Aristotle makes belief a part of reason, but sees desires as separate [Aristotle, by Sorabji] |
23311 | Aristotle sees reason as much more specific than our more everyday concept of it [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
23300 | Aristotle and the Stoics denied rationality to animals, while Platonists affirmed it [Aristotle, by Sorabji] |
23310 | Animals live by sensations, and some have good memories, but they don't connect experiences [Aristotle] |
11245 | Many memories make up a single experience [Aristotle] |
10954 | It is unclear whether acute angles are prior to right angles, or fingers to men [Aristotle] |
9789 | You can't abstract natural properties to make Forms - objects and attributes are defined together [Aristotle] |
9070 | We learn primitives and universals by induction from perceptions [Aristotle] |
9788 | Mathematicians study what is conceptually separable, and doesn't lead to error [Aristotle] |
9792 | Mathematicians study quantity and continuity, and remove the perceptible features of things [Aristotle] |
9077 | Mathematicians suppose inseparable aspects to be separable, and study them in isolation [Aristotle] |
9075 | If health happened to be white, the science of health would not study whiteness [Aristotle] |
2337 | For Aristotle meaning and reference are linked to concepts [Aristotle, by Putnam] |
5107 | Predicates are substance, quality, place, relation, quantity and action or affection [Aristotle] |
12349 | Only what can be said of many things is a predicable [Aristotle, by Wedin] |
11837 | Some predicates signify qualification of a substance, others the substance itself [Aristotle] |
13763 | Spoken sounds vary between people, but are signs of affections of soul, which are the same for all [Aristotle] |
11240 | The notion of analytic truth is absent in Aristotle [Aristotle, by Politis] |
116 | Rhetoric is irrational about its means and its ends [Plato] |
22570 | Rhetoric now enables good speakers to become popular leaders [Aristotle] |
3324 | Plato's whole philosophy may be based on being duped by reification - a figure of speech [Benardete,JA on Plato] |
5945 | The 'Republic' is a great work of rhetorical theory [Lawson-Tancred on Plato] |
158 | An excellent speech seems to imply a knowledge of the truth in the mind of the speaker [Plato] |
159 | Only a good philosopher can be a good speaker [Plato] |
283 | The question of whether or not to persuade comes before the science of persuasion [Plato] |
5946 | 'Phaedrus' pioneers the notion of philosophical rhetoric [Lawson-Tancred on Plato] |
5849 | Rhetoric is a political offshoot of dialectic and ethics [Aristotle] |
114 | Rhetoric can produce conviction, but not educate people about right and wrong [Plato] |
1705 | It doesn't have to be the case that in opposed views one is true and the other false [Aristotle] |
12368 | Negation takes something away from something [Aristotle] |
1692 | If you shouldn't argue in metaphors, then you shouldn't try to define them either [Aristotle] |
4380 | Not all actions aim at some good; akratic actions, for example, do not [Burnyeat on Aristotle] |
135 | All activity aims at the good [Plato] |
23316 | For Plato and Aristotle there is no will; there is only rational desire for what is seen as good [Plato, by Frede,M] |
23320 | Choice is not explained by the will, but by the operation of reason when it judges what is good [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
5211 | An action is voluntary if the limb movements originate in the agent [Aristotle] |
5221 | Deliberation ends when the starting-point of an action is traced back to the dominant part of the self [Aristotle] |
4383 | Aristotle seems not to explain why the better syllogism is overcome in akratic actions [Burnyeat on Aristotle] |
68 | The akrates acts from desire not choice, and the enkrates acts from choice not desire [Aristotle] |
4318 | Virtue is right reason and feeling and action. Akrasia and enkrateia are lower levels of action. [Aristotle, by Cottingham] |
4372 | Akrasia merely neglects or misunderstands knowledge, rather than opposing it [Achtenberg on Aristotle] |
5254 | Some people explain akrasia by saying only opinion is present, not knowledge [Aristotle] |
5255 | A person may act against one part of his knowledge, if he knows both universal and particular [Aristotle] |
23317 | Aristotle sees akrasia as acting against what is chosen, not against reason [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
23318 | Akrasia is explained by past mental failures, not by a specific choice [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
22574 | A community can lack self-control [Aristotle] |
5257 | Licentious people feel no regret, but weak-willed people are capable of repentance [Aristotle] |
23918 | Akrasia is the clash of two feelings - goodness and pleasure [Aristotle] |
24060 | Self-controlled follow understanding, when it is opposed to desires [Aristotle] |
22515 | Choice results when deliberation brings together an opinion with an inclination [Aristotle] |
16 | We avoid evil either through a natural aversion, or because we have acquired knowledge [Plato] |
5249 | One cannot be prudent without being good [Aristotle] |
73 | Practical intellect serves to arrive at the truth which corresponds to right appetite [Aristotle] |
4371 | Seeing particulars as parts of larger wholes is to perceive their value [Achtenberg on Aristotle] |
69 | We deliberate about means, not ends [Aristotle] |
5247 | Prudence is mainly concerned with particulars, which is the sphere of human conduct [Aristotle] |
80 | Virtue ensures that we have correct aims, and prudence that we have correct means of achieving them [Aristotle] |
82 | The one virtue of prudence carries with it the possession of all the other virtues [Aristotle] |
22508 | Unlike in inanimate things, in animate things actions have more than one starting point [Aristotle] |
22514 | The deliberative part of the soul discerns explanatory causes [Aristotle] |
20212 | Practical reason is truth-attaining, and focused on actions good for human beings [Aristotle] |
1655 | If goodness needs true opinion but not knowledge, you can skip the 'examined life' [Vlastos on Plato] |
67 | Bad people are just ignorant of what they ought to do [Aristotle] |
5218 | Some people are good at forming opinions, but bad at making moral choices [Aristotle] |
81 | For Socrates virtues are principles, involving knowledge, but we say they only imply the principle of practical reason [Aristotle] |
203 | Courage is knowing what should or shouldn't be feared [Plato] |
20042 | We assign the cause of someone's walking when we say why they are doing it [Aristotle] |
5267 | Our reasoned acts are held to be voluntary and our own doing [Aristotle] |
5213 | If you repent of an act done through ignorance, you acted involuntarily, not non-voluntarily [Aristotle] |
22507 | An action is voluntary when it is accompanied by thought of some kind [Aristotle] |
4384 | For Aristotle responsibility seems negative, in the absence of force or ignorance [Irwin on Aristotle] |
23319 | We are responsible if our actions reflect our motivation [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
5212 | A man should sooner die than do some dreadful things, no matter how cruel the death [Aristotle] |
172 | Love of ugliness is impossible [Plato] |
390 | If goodness involves moderation and proportion, then it seems to be found in beauty [Plato] |
299 | What is fine is always difficult [Plato] |
52 | We choose things for their fineness, their advantage, or for pleasure [Aristotle] |
249 | People who value beauty above virtue insult the soul by placing the body above it [Plato] |
155 | Beauty is the clearest and most lovely of the Forms [Plato] |
173 | Beauty and goodness are the same [Plato] |
4026 | Beauty is harmony with what is divine, and ugliness is lack of such harmony [Plato] |
2837 | Nothing contrary to nature is beautiful [Aristotle] |
184 | Progress goes from physical beauty, to moral beauty, to the beauty of knowledge, and reaches absolute beauty [Plato] |
183 | Stage two is the realisation that beauty of soul is of more value than beauty of body [Plato] |
282 | Non-physical beauty can only be shown clearly by speech [Plato] |
5851 | Pentathletes look the most beautiful, because they combine speed and strength [Aristotle] |
636 | Beauty involves the Forms of order, symmetry and limit, which can be handled mathematically [Aristotle] |
171 | Music is a knowledge of love in the realm of harmony and rhythm [Plato] |
316 | Music has harmony like the soul, and serves to reorder disharmony within us [Plato] |
16565 | Without the surface decoration, poetry shows only appearances and nothing of what is real [Plato] |
16566 | Poetry is more philosophic than history, as it concerns universals, not particulars [Aristotle] |
2160 | Representation is two steps removed from the truth [Plato] |
2824 | The collective judgement of many people on art is better than that of an individual [Aristotle] |
2135 | Truth is closely related to proportion [Plato] |
2163 | Artists should be excluded from a law-abiding community, because they destroy the rational mind [Plato] |
468 | Musical performance can reveal a range of virtues [Damon of Ath.] |
297 | What is fine is the parent of goodness [Plato] |
2846 | Music can mould the character to be virtuous (just as gymnastics trains the body) [Aristotle] |
635 | The good is found in actions, but beauty can exist without movement [Aristotle] |
168 | To understand morality requires a soul [Plato] |
2141 | I suggest that we forget about trying to define goodness itself for the time being [Plato] |
302 | What knowledge is required to live well? [Plato] |
45 | We aim not to identify goodness, but to be good [Aristotle] |
46 | We must take for granted that we should act according to right principle [Aristotle] |
5153 | There is no fixed art of good conduct, and each situation is different, as in navigation [Aristotle] |
22512 | Acts are voluntary if done knowingly, by the agent, and in his power to avoid it [Aristotle] |
1869 | The good cannot be expressed in words, but imprints itself upon the soul [Plato, by Celsus] |
7503 | Plato never refers to examining the conscience [Plato, by Foucault] |
143 | The two ruling human principles are the natural desire for pleasure, and an acquired love of virtue [Plato] |
5858 | Men are physically prime at thirty-five, and mentally prime at forty-nine [Aristotle] |
5134 | Perhaps we get a better account of happiness as the good for man if we know his function [Aristotle] |
31 | If bodily organs have functions, presumably the whole person has one [Aristotle] |
5231 | To eat vast amounts is unnatural, since natural desire is to replenish the deficiency [Aristotle] |
22509 | What is natural for us is either there at birth, or appears by normal processes [Aristotle] |
6559 | Aristotle never actually says that man is a rational animal [Aristotle, by Fogelin] |
4115 | Plato found that he could only enforce rational moral justification by creating an authoritarian society [Williams,B on Plato] |
5234 | For the great-souled man it is sometimes better to be dead [Aristotle] |
122 | Moral rules are made by the weak members of humanity [Plato] |
2173 | As religion and convention collapsed, Plato sought morals not just in knowledge, but in the soul [Williams,B on Plato] |
21 | Moral acts are so varied that they must be convention, not nature [Aristotle] |
2807 | Some say slavery is unnatural and created by convention, and is therefore forced, and unjust [Aristotle] |
5855 | We all feel universal right and wrong, independent of any community or contracts [Aristotle] |
5075 | Aristotle said there are two levels of virtue - the conventional and the intellectual [Taylor,R on Aristotle] |
4370 | For Aristotle 'good' means purpose, and value is real but relational [Achtenberg on Aristotle] |
4547 | Plato measured the degree of reality by the degree of value [Nietzsche on Plato] |
18227 | We desire final things just for themselves, and not for the sake of something else [Aristotle] |
4381 | How can an action be intrinsically good if it is a means to 'eudaimonia'? [Ackrill on Aristotle] |
18230 | No one would choose life just for activities not done for their own sake [Aristotle] |
2094 | A thing's function is what it alone can do, or what it does better than other things [Plato] |
2095 | If something has a function then it has a state of being good [Plato] |
398 | Each thing that has a function is for the sake of that function [Aristotle] |
33 | Each named function has a distinctive excellence attached to it [Aristotle] |
23909 | Wearing a shoe is its intrinsic use, and selling it (as a shoe) is its coincidental use [Aristotle] |
15772 | A thing's active function is its end [Aristotle] |
5154 | Excess and deficiency are bad for virtue, just as they are for bodily health [Aristotle] |
5268 | Disreputable pleasures are only pleasant to persons with diseased perception [Aristotle] |
5870 | Everything seeks, not a single good, but its own separate good [Aristotle] |
2129 | Goodness is mental health, badness is mental sickness [Plato] |
5229 | The more virtuous and happy a person is, the worse the prospect becomes of ending life [Aristotle] |
90 | All altruism is an extension of self-love [Aristotle] |
1590 | The just man does not harm his enemies, but benefits everyone [Plato] |
22582 | Spirit [thumos] is the capacity by which we love [Aristotle] |
14177 | Love assists men in achieving merit and happiness [Plato] |
5263 | Most people want to be loved rather than to love, because they desire honour [Aristotle] |
176 | Love follows beauty, wisdom is exceptionally beautiful, so love follows wisdom [Plato] |
179 | Love is desire for perpetual possession of the good [Plato] |
5262 | Only lovable things are loved, and they must be good, or pleasant, or useful [Aristotle] |
139 | A good person is bound to act well, and this brings happiness [Plato] |
2689 | Good people enjoy virtuous action, just as musicians enjoy beautiful melodies [Aristotle] |
101 | Slaves can't be happy, because they lack freedom [Aristotle] |
5142 | Oxen, horses and children cannot be happy, because they cannot perform fine deeds [Aristotle] |
128 | Is it natural to simply indulge our selfish desires? [Plato] |
92 | Self-love benefits ourselves, and also helps others [Aristotle] |
2810 | Selfishness is wrong not because it is self-love, but because it is excessive [Aristotle] |
5243 | The best people exercise their virtue towards others, rather than to themselves [Aristotle] |
3559 | For Aristotle, true self-love is love of the higher parts of one's soul [Aristotle, by Annas] |
2168 | Clever criminals do well at first, but not in the long run [Plato] |
12 | If we were invisible, would the just man become like the unjust? [Plato] |
202 | No one willingly and knowingly embraces evil [Plato] |
4007 | For Plato we abandon honour and pleasure once we see the Good [Plato, by Taylor,C] |
2139 | Every person, and every activity, aims at the good [Plato] |
5128 | Each category of existence has its own good, so one Good cannot unite them [Aristotle] |
5129 | There should be one science of the one Good, but there are many overlapping sciences [Aristotle] |
629 | Is the good a purpose, a source of movement, or a pure form? [Aristotle] |
2164 | Bad is always destructive, where good preserves and benefits [Plato] |
391 | The good involves beauty, proportion and truth [Plato] |
392 | Neither intellect nor pleasure are the good, because they are not perfect and self-sufficient [Plato] |
2137 | The main aim is to understand goodness, which gives everything its value and advantage [Plato] |
2147 | The sight of goodness leads to all that is fine and true and right [Plato] |
2143 | Good has the same role in the world of knowledge as the sun has in the physical world [Plato] |
2144 | Goodness makes truth and knowledge possible [Plato] |
295 | The good is beautiful [Plato] |
20 | The good is 'that at which all things aim' [Aristotle] |
393 | Good first, then beauty, then reason, then knowledge, then pleasure [Plato, by PG] |
9274 | Plato's legacy to European thought was the Good, the Beautiful and the True [Plato, by Gray] |
5110 | Goodness is when a thing (such as a circle) is complete, and conforms with its nature [Aristotle] |
5131 | Intelligence and sight, and some pleasures and honours, are candidates for being good in themselves [Aristotle] |
5135 | Goods are external, of the soul, and of the body; those of the soul (such as action) come first [Aristotle] |
177 | If a person is good they will automatically become happy [Plato] |
2138 | Pleasure is commonly thought to be the good, though the more ingenious prefer knowledge [Plato] |
301 | Only knowledge of some sort is good [Plato] |
2070 | Even people who think pleasure is the good admit that there are bad pleasures [Plato] |
4322 | In slaking our thirst the goodness of the action and the pleasure are clearly separate [Plato] |
136 | Good should be the aim of pleasant activity, not the other way round [Plato] |
94 | Pleasure is better with the addition of intelligence, so pleasure is not the good [Plato, by Aristotle] |
23 | The masses believe, not unreasonably, that the good is pleasure [Aristotle] |
5269 | Pleasure is not the Good, and not every pleasure is desirable [Aristotle] |
109 | Clearly perfect conduct will involve both good intention and good action [Aristotle] |
265 | An action is only just if it is performed by someone with a just character and outlook [Plato] |
5877 | We judge people from their deeds because we cannot see their choices (which matter more) [Aristotle] |
22555 | The function of good men is to confer benefits [Aristotle] |
193 | Some things are good even though they are not beneficial to men [Plato] |
26 | Wealth is not the good, because it is only a means [Aristotle] |
269 | Attempted murder is like real murder, but we should respect the luck which avoided total ruin [Plato] |
25 | You can be good while asleep, or passive, or in pain [Aristotle] |
5136 | Happiness seems to involve virtue, or practical reason, or wisdom, or pleasure, or external goods [Aristotle] |
5868 | Horses, birds and fish are not happy, lacking a divine aspect to their natures [Aristotle] |
18673 | Eudaimonia is said to only have final value, where reason and virtue are also useful [Aristotle, by Orsi] |
5127 | Does Aristotle say eudaimonia is the aim, or that it ought to be? [McDowell on Aristotle] |
5143 | Some good and evil can happen to the dead, just as the living may be unaware of a disaster [Aristotle] |
14178 | Happiness is secure enjoyment of what is good and beautiful [Plato] |
2681 | Aristotle is unsure about eudaimonia because he is unsure what people are [Nagel on Aristotle] |
5132 | Goods like pleasure are chosen partly for happiness, but happiness is chosen just for itself [Aristotle] |
30 | Happiness is perfect and self-sufficient, the end of all action [Aristotle] |
17947 | Plato decided that the virtuous and happy life was the philosophical life [Plato, by Nehamas] |
332 | One should exercise both the mind and the body, to avoid imbalance [Plato] |
39 | Happiness needs total goodness and a complete life [Aristotle] |
100 | The happy life is in accordance with goodness, which implies seriousness [Aristotle] |
5850 | Happiness is composed of a catalogue of internal and external benefits [Aristotle] |
5139 | If happiness can be achieved by study and effort, then it is open to anyone who is not corrupt [Aristotle] |
5144 | Happiness is activity in accordance with complete virtue, for a whole life, with adequate external goods [Aristotle] |
5865 | Happiness involves three things, of which the greatest is either wisdom, virtue, or pleasure [Aristotle] |
106 | The best life is that of the intellect, since that is in the fullest sense the man [Aristotle] |
385 | Some of the pleasures and pains we feel are false [Plato] |
4376 | Pleasure and pain are perceptions of things as good or bad [Aristotle] |
4374 | For Aristotle, pleasure is the perception of particulars as valuable [Achtenberg on Aristotle] |
2157 | Nice smells are intensive, have no preceding pain, and no bad after-effect [Plato] |
387 | A small pure pleasure is much finer than a large one contaminated with pain [Plato] |
5270 | Intellectual pleasures are superior to sensuous ones [Aristotle] |
5230 | There are pleasures of the soul (e.g. civic honour, and learning) and of the body [Aristotle] |
383 | God feels one simple pleasure forever [Aristotle] |
98 | It is right to pursue pleasure, because it enhances life, and life is a thing to choose [Aristotle] |
379 | The good must be sufficient and perfect, and neither intellect nor pleasure are that [Plato] |
5259 | If we criticise bodily pleasures as licentious and bad, why do we consider their opposite, pain, to be bad? [Aristotle] |
96 | Nobody would choose the mentality of a child, even if they had the greatest childish pleasures [Aristotle] |
99 | If happiness were mere amusement it wouldn't be worth a lifetime's effort [Aristotle] |
200 | People tend only to disapprove of pleasure if it leads to pain, or prevents future pleasure [Plato] |
197 | Some pleasures are not good, and some pains are not evil [Plato] |
373 | Pleasure is certainly very pleasant, but it doesn't follow that all pleasures are good [Plato] |
97 | There are many things we would want even if they brought no pleasure [Aristotle] |
157 | Most pleasure is release from pain, and is therefore not worthwhile [Plato] |
371 | Reason, memory, truth and wisdom are far better than pleasure, for those who can attain them [Plato] |
240 | It would be strange if the gods rewarded those who experienced the most pleasure in life [Plato] |
2134 | Philosophers are concerned with totally non-physical pleasures [Plato] |
382 | It is unlikely that the gods feel either pleasure or pain [Plato] |
376 | Would you prefer a life of pleasure without reason, or one of reason without pleasure? [Plato] |
2156 | There are three types of pleasure, for reason, for spirit and for appetite [Plato] |
381 | We feel pleasure when we approach our natural state of harmony [Plato] |
5256 | Some things are not naturally pleasant, but become so through disease or depravity [Aristotle] |
5258 | While replenishing we even enjoy unpleasant things, but only absolute pleasures when we are replenished [Aristotle] |
134 | Good and bad people seem to experience equal amounts of pleasure and pain [Plato] |
53 | Feeling inappropriate pleasure or pain affects conduct, and is central to morality [Aristotle] |
49 | Character is revealed by the pleasures and pains people feel [Aristotle] |
386 | Intense pleasure and pain are not felt in a good body, but in a worthless one [Plato] |
328 | Everything that takes place naturally is pleasant [Plato] |
361 | It is a mistake to think that the most violent pleasure or pain is therefore the truest reality [Plato] |
2158 | Pleasure-seekers desperately seek illusory satisfaction, like filling a leaky vessel [Plato] |
84 | The greater the pleasure, the greater the hindrance to thought [Aristotle] |
264 | The conquest of pleasure is the noblest victory of all [Plato] |
132 | If happiness is the satisfaction of desires, then a life of scratching itches should be happiness [Plato] |
4319 | In a fool's mind desire is like a leaky jar, insatiable in its desires, and order and contentment are better [Plato] |
2123 | Excessive pleasure deranges people, making the other virtues impossible [Plato] |
5856 | Self-interest is a relative good, but nobility an absolute good [Aristotle] |
1636 | Wickedness is an illness of the soul [Plato] |
2166 | We should behave well even if invisible, for the health of the mind [Plato] |
88 | Nobody would choose all the good things in world, if the price was loss of identity [Aristotle] |
91 | A man is his own best friend; therefore he ought to love himself best [Aristotle] |
388 | Hedonists must say that someone in pain is bad, even if they are virtuous [Plato] |
130 | Is the happiest state one of sensual, self-indulgent freedom? [Plato] |
377 | If you lived a life of maximum pleasure, would you still be lacking anything? [Plato] |
378 | A life of pure pleasure with no intellect is the life of a jellyfish [Plato] |
71 | Licentiousness concerns the animal-like pleasures of touch and taste [Aristotle] |
19946 | Morality is a compromise, showing restraint, to avoid suffering wrong without compensation [Plato] |
2097 | Isn't it better to have a reputation for goodness than to actually be good? [Plato] |
5 | Justice is merely the interests of the stronger party [Plato] |
7 | Surely you don't return a borrowed weapon to a mad friend? [Plato] |
8 | Is right just the interests of the powerful? [Plato] |
15 | Sin first, then sacrifice to the gods from the proceeds [Plato] |
13785 | 'Arete' signifies lack of complexity and a free-flowing soul [Plato] |
6015 | Plato, unusually, said that theoretical and practical wisdom are inseparable [Plato, by Kraut] |
5848 | All good things can be misused, except virtue [Aristotle] |
5853 | The best virtues are the most useful to others [Aristotle] |
5111 | All moral virtue is concerned with bodily pleasure and pain [Aristotle] |
34 | The good for man is an activity of soul in accordance with virtue [Aristotle] |
5137 | Many pleasures are relative to a person, but some love what is pleasant by nature, and virtue is like that [Aristotle] |
4342 | Aristotle must hold that virtuous King Priam's life can be marred, but not ruined [Hursthouse on Aristotle] |
4382 | Feelings are vital to virtue, but virtue requires choice, which feelings lack [Kosman on Aristotle] |
58 | If virtues are not feelings or faculties, then they must be dispositions [Aristotle] |
54 | Actions are not virtuous because of their quality, but because of the way they are done [Aristotle] |
4373 | Virtue is the feeling of emotions that accord with one's perception of value [Achtenberg on Aristotle] |
63 | Virtue is a purposive mean disposition, which follows a rational principle and prudent judgment [Aristotle] |
5214 | Acts may be forgivable if particular facts (rather than principles) are unknown [Aristotle] |
5215 | There are six categories of particular cirumstance affecting an action [Aristotle] |
5216 | An act is involuntary if the particular facts (esp. circumstances and effect) are unknown [Aristotle] |
107 | A life of moral virtue brings human happiness, but not divine happiness [Aristotle] |
55 | People who perform just acts unwillingly or ignorantly are still not just [Aristotle] |
5876 | Virtue is different from continence [Aristotle] |
591 | Excellence is a sort of completion [Aristotle] |
625 | Is excellence separate from things, or part of them, or both? [Aristotle] |
5149 | The two main parts of the soul give rise to two groups of virtues - intellectual, and moral [Aristotle] |
5156 | How can good actions breed virtues, if you need to be virtuous to perform good actions? [Aristotle] |
5157 | If a thing has excellence, this makes the thing good, and means it functions well [Aristotle] |
5872 | Excellence is the best state of anything (like a cloak) which has an employment or function [Aristotle] |
4369 | It is not universals we must perceive for virtue, but particulars, seen as intrinsically good [Aristotle, by Achtenberg] |
5158 | Actions concern particular cases, and rules must fit the cases, not the other way round [Aristotle] |
5237 | We cannot properly judge by rules, because blame depends on perception of particulars [Aristotle] |
3548 | Aristotle neglects the place of rules in the mature virtuous person [Annas on Aristotle] |
4367 | Moral virtue is not natural, because its behaviour can be changed, unlike a falling stone [Aristotle] |
5223 | We are partly responsible for our own dispositions and virtues [Aristotle] |
4362 | Dispositions to virtue are born in us, but without intelligence they can be harmful [Aristotle] |
182 | The first step on the right path is the contemplation of physical beauty when young [Plato] |
5225 | The end of virtue is what is right and honourable or fine [Aristotle] |
120 | Should we avoid evil because it will bring us bad consequences? [Plato] |
170 | The only slavery which is not dishonourable is slavery to excellence [Plato] |
263 | The only worthwhile life is one devoted to physical and moral perfection [Plato] |
253 | Every crime is the result of excessive self-love [Plato] |
144 | Reason impels us towards excellence, which teaches us self-control [Plato] |
5944 | For Plato, virtue is its own reward [Lawson-Tancred on Plato] |
4332 | Virtue is a concord of reason and emotion, with pleasure and pain trained to correct ends [Plato] |
248 | A serious desire for moral excellence is very rare indeed [Plato] |
22557 | Virtuous people are like the citizens of the best city [Aristotle] |
2841 | People become good because of nature, habit and reason [Aristotle] |
56 | A person is good if they act from choice, and for the sake of the actions in themselves [Aristotle] |
93 | Existence is desirable if one is conscious of one's own goodness [Aristotle] |
189 | If we punish wrong-doers, it shows that we believe virtue can be taught [Plato] |
204 | Socrates is contradicting himself in claiming virtue can't be taught, but that it is knowledge [Plato] |
235 | Virtue is the aim of all laws [Plato] |
2690 | Associating with good people can be a training in virtue [Aristotle] |
188 | Socrates did not believe that virtue could be taught [Plato] |
1913 | Is virtue taught, or achieved by practice, or a natural aptitude, or what? [Plato] |
1921 | If virtue is a type of knowledge then it ought to be taught [Plato] |
1927 | It seems that virtue is neither natural nor taught, but is a divine gift [Plato] |
43 | Nature enables us to be virtuous, but habit develops virtue in us [Aristotle] |
44 | We acquire virtues by habitually performing good deeds [Aristotle] |
5152 | Like activities produce like dispositions, so we must give the right quality to the activity [Aristotle] |
51 | True education is training from infancy to have correct feelings [Aristotle] |
4378 | We must practise virtuous acts because practice actually teaches us the nature of virtue [Burnyeat on Aristotle] |
6793 | People can break into the circle of virtue and good action, by chance, or with help [Aristotle] |
57 | We acquire virtue by the repeated performance of just and temperate acts [Aristotle] |
5875 | Character (éthos) is developed from habit (ethos) [Aristotle] |
5222 | A person of good character sees the truth about what is actually fine and pleasant [Aristotle] |
4394 | People develop their characters through the activities they pursue [Aristotle] |
5239 | When people speak of justice they mean a disposition of character to behave justly [Aristotle] |
4379 | It is very hard to change a person's character traits by argument [Aristotle] |
4386 | Character can be heroic, excellent, controlled, uncontrolled, bad, or brutish [Aristotle, by Urmson] |
5250 | The three states of character to avoid are vice, 'akrasia' and brutishness [Aristotle] |
5874 | Character virtues (such as courage) are of the non-rational part, which follows the rational part [Aristotle] |
118 | I would rather be a victim of crime than a criminal [Plato] |
22516 | Character is shown by what is or is not enjoyed, and virtue chooses the mean among them [Aristotle] |
22517 | We judge character not by their actions, but by their reasons for actions [Aristotle] |
4388 | One drink a day is moderation, but very drunk once a week could exhibit the mean [Urmson on Aristotle] |
4387 | In most normal situations it is not appropriate to have any feelings at all [Urmson on Aristotle] |
62 | We must tune our feelings to be right in every way [Aristotle] |
2829 | The law is the mean [Aristotle] |
5159 | The mean is always right, and the extremes are always wrong [Aristotle] |
65 | The vices to which we are most strongly pulled are most opposed to the mean [Aristotle] |
5161 | To make one's anger exactly appropriate to a situation is very difficult [Aristotle] |
5235 | Patient people are indignant, but only appropriately, as their reason prescribes [Aristotle] |
5238 | The sincere man is praiseworthy, because truth is the mean between boasting and irony [Aristotle] |
23914 | People sometimes exhibit both extremes together, but the mean is contrary to both of them [Aristotle] |
60 | The mean is relative to the individual (diet, for example) [Aristotle] |
305 | Something which lies midway between two evils is better than either of them [Plato] |
281 | The arts produce good and beautiful things by preserving the mean [Plato] |
47 | Virtues are destroyed by the excess and preserved by the mean [Aristotle] |
4406 | Aristotle aims at happiness by depressing emotions to a harmless mean [Nietzsche on Aristotle] |
61 | Skills are only well performed if they observe the mean [Aristotle] |
3545 | The mean implies that vices are opposed to one another, not to virtue [Aristotle, by Annas] |
5217 | At times we ought to feel angry, and we ought to desire health and learning [Aristotle] |
5236 | It is foolish not to be angry when it is appropriate [Aristotle] |
23911 | Possessors of a virtue tend to despise what reason shows to be its opposite [Aristotle] |
22590 | Virtue is concerned with correct feelings [Aristotle] |
64 | There is no right time or place or way or person for the committing of adultery; it is just wrong [Aristotle] |
1916 | Even if virtues are many and various, they must have something in common to make them virtues [Plato] |
4117 | Nowadays we (unlike Aristotle) seem agreed that someone can have one virtue but lack others [Williams,B on Aristotle] |
1918 | How can you know part of virtue without knowing the whole? [Plato] |
23910 | Greatness of soul produces all the virtues - and vice versa [Aristotle] |
277 | The Guardians must aim to discover the common element in the four cardinal virtues [Plato] |
2155 | True goodness requires mental unity and harmony [Plato] |
2126 | A good community necessarily has wisdom, courage, self-discipline and morality [Plato] |
5251 | Gods exist in a state which is morally superior to virtue [Aristotle] |
12277 | Friendship is preferable to money, since its excess is preferable [Aristotle] |
12276 | Justice and self-control are better than courage, because they are always useful [Aristotle] |
140 | Self-indulgent desire makes friendship impossible, because it makes a person incapable of co-operation [Plato] |
254 | Excessive laughter and tears must be avoided [Plato] |
131 | If absence of desire is happiness, then nothing is happier than a stone or a corpse [Plato] |
23908 | If someone just looks at or listens to beautiful things, they would not be thought intemperate [Aristotle] |
2813 | It is quite possible to live a moderate life and yet be miserable [Aristotle] |
129 | Do most people praise self-discipline and justice because they are too timid to gain their own pleasure? [Plato] |
5261 | Between friends there is no need for justice [Aristotle] |
2092 | Simonides said morality is helping one's friends and harming one's enemies [Plato] |
266 | Injustice is the mastery of the soul by bad feelings, even if they do not lead to harm [Plato] |
22553 | Justice is a virtue of communities [Aristotle] |
23562 | If the parts of our soul do their correct work, we will be just people, and will act justly [Plato] |
4389 | What emotion is displayed in justice, and what are its deficiency and excess? [Urmson on Aristotle] |
23556 | Particular justice concerns specific temptations, but universal justice concerns the whole character [Aristotle] |
5151 | Justice concerns our behaviour in dealing with other people [Aristotle] |
5240 | The word 'unjust' describes law-breaking and exploitation [Aristotle] |
119 | A criminal is worse off if he avoids punishment [Plato] |
5242 | Justice is whatever creates or preserves social happiness [Aristotle] |
23905 | Courage follows reason, which tells us to choose what is noble [Aristotle] |
5226 | True courage is an appropriate response to a dangerous situation [Aristotle] |
5224 | Strictly speaking, a courageous person is one who does not fear an honourable death [Aristotle] |
293 | Being unafraid (perhaps through ignorance) and being brave are two different things [Plato] |
24 | Honour depends too much on the person who awards it [Aristotle] |
5233 | Honour is clearly the greatest external good [Aristotle] |
4119 | If you aim at honour, you make yourself dependent on the people to whom you wish to be superior [Aristotle, by Williams,B] |
23912 | Honour depends on what it is for, and whether it is bestowed by worthy people [Aristotle] |
5857 | The young feel pity from philanthropy, but the old from self-concern [Aristotle] |
18229 | Only contemplation is sought for its own sake; practical activity always offers some gain [Aristotle] |
5272 | The intellectual life is divine in comparison with ordinary human life [Aristotle] |
105 | We should aspire to immortality, and live by what is highest in us [Aristotle] |
18232 | The gods live, but action is unworthy of them, so that only leaves contemplation? [Aristotle] |
110 | Lower animals cannot be happy, because they cannot contemplate [Aristotle] |
111 | The more people contemplate, the happier they are [Aristotle] |
621 | Contemplation is a supreme pleasure and excellence [Aristotle] |
104 | Contemplation (with the means to achieve it) is the perfect happiness for man [Aristotle] |
5138 | The fine deeds required for happiness need external resources, like friends or wealth [Aristotle] |
38 | A man can't be happy if he is ugly, or of low birth, or alone and childless [Aristotle] |
1665 | It is nonsense to say a good person is happy even if they are being tortured or suffering disaster [Aristotle] |
5871 | Goods in the soul are more worthy than those outside it, as everybody wants them [Aristotle] |
4320 | The popular view is that health is first, good looks second, and honest wealth third [Plato] |
256 | Virtue and great wealth are incompatible [Plato] |
5859 | Rich people are mindlessly happy [Aristotle] |
242 | The best people are produced where there is no excess of wealth or poverty [Plato] |
22561 | The rich are seen as noble, because they don't need to commit crimes [Aristotle] |
108 | The virtue of generosity requires money [Aristotle] |
351 | War aims at the acquisition of wealth, because we are enslaved to the body [Plato] |
294 | People say that friendship exists only between good men [Plato] |
2686 | Aristotle does not confine supreme friendship to moral heroes [Cooper,JM on Aristotle] |
2687 | For Aristotle in the best friendships the binding force is some excellence of character [Cooper,JM on Aristotle] |
23919 | Friendship cannot be immediate; it takes time, and needs testing [Aristotle] |
23920 | Decent people can be friends with base people [Aristotle] |
2808 | Master and slave can have friendship through common interests [Aristotle] |
12275 | We value friendship just for its own sake [Aristotle] |
156 | Bad people are never really friends with one another [Plato] |
85 | Bad men can have friendships of utility or pleasure, but only good men can be true friends [Aristotle] |
5252 | 'Enkrateia' (control) means abiding by one's own calculations [Aristotle] |
2912 | Plato is boring [Nietzsche on Plato] |
5245 | Society collapses if people cannot rely on exchanging good for good and evil for evil [Aristotle] |
5265 | Even more than a social being, man is a pairing and family being [Aristotle] |
2803 | Man is by nature a political animal [Aristotle] |
2820 | People want to live together, even when they don't want mutual help [Aristotle] |
22586 | Only humans have reason [Aristotle] |
12281 | Man is intrinsically a civilized animal [Aristotle] |
19889 | People need society because the individual has too many needs [Plato] |
5133 | Man is by nature a social being [Aristotle] |
22523 | The community (of villages) becomes a city when it is totally self-sufficient [Aristotle] |
2805 | A community must share a common view of good and justice [Aristotle] |
22526 | People who are anti-social or wholly self-sufficient are no part of a city [Aristotle] |
22535 | Friendship is the best good for cities, because it reduces factions [Aristotle] |
22584 | A community should all share to some extent in something like land or food [Aristotle] |
22532 | A city can't become entirely one, because its very nature is to be a multitude [Aristotle] |
22581 | The size of a city is decided by the maximum self-sufficient community that can be surveyed [Aristotle] |
137 | As with other things, a good state is organised and orderly [Plato] |
19890 | All exchanges in a community are for mutual benefit [Plato] |
86 | A bad political constitution (especially a tyranny) makes friendship almost impossible [Aristotle] |
5140 | Political science aims at the highest good, which involves creating virtue in citizens [Aristotle] |
23915 | The main function of politics is to produce friendship [Aristotle] |
22577 | What is the best life for everyone, and is that a communal or an individual problem? [Aristotle] |
22578 | The happiest city is the one that acts most nobly [Aristotle] |
22579 | The same four cardinal virtues which apply to individuals also apply to a city [Aristotle] |
22548 | A city aims at living well [Aristotle] |
2431 | Every state is an association formed for some good purpose [Aristotle] |
10 | After a taste of mutual harm, men make a legal contract to avoid it [Plato] |
2832 | The state aims to consist as far as possible of those who are like and equal [Aristotle] |
5852 | The four constitutions are democracy (freedom), oligarchy (wealth), aristocracy (custom), tyranny (security) [Aristotle] |
21046 | The aim of legislators, and of a good constitution, is to create good citizens [Aristotle] |
22580 | The best constitution enables everyone to live the best life [Aristotle] |
22546 | A city is a community of free people, and the constitution should aim at the common advantage [Aristotle] |
2821 | The six constitutions are monarchy/tyranny, aristocracy/oligarchy, and polity/democracy [Aristotle] |
22558 | Constitutions specify distribution of offices, the authorities, and the community's aim [Aristotle] |
22566 | The greed of the rich is more destructive than the greed of the people [Aristotle] |
2835 | Any constitution can be made to last for a day or two [Aristotle] |
2973 | We must decide the most desirable human life before designing a constitution [Aristotle] |
23561 | People doing their jobs properly is the fourth cardinal virtue for a city [Plato] |
22544 | A citizen is someone who is allowed to hold official posts in a city [Aristotle] |
2818 | The virtues of a good citizen are relative to a particular constitution [Aristotle] |
22545 | A person can be an excellent citizen without being an excellent man [Aristotle] |
22563 | The middle classes are neither ambitious nor anarchic, which is good [Aristotle] |
22541 | Kings should be selected according to character [Aristotle] |
245 | Totalitarian states destroy friendships and community spirit [Plato] |
2132 | Only rule by philosophers of integrity can keep a community healthy [Plato] |
22583 | The guardians should not be harsh to strangers, as no one should behave like that [Aristotle] |
2149 | Reluctant rulers make a better and more unified administration [Plato] |
2819 | The only virtue special to a ruler is practical wisdom [Aristotle] |
22552 | The rich can claim to rule, because of land ownership, and being more trustworthy [Aristotle] |
22542 | People who buy public office will probably expect to profit from it [Aristotle] |
5241 | We hold that every piece of legislation is just [Aristotle] |
22543 | In large communities it is better if more people participate in the offices [Aristotle] |
22539 | Election of officials by the elected is dangerous, because factions can control it [Aristotle] |
22572 | Officers should like the constitution, be capable, and have appropriate virtues and justice [Aristotle] |
22567 | Democracy arises when people who are given equal freedom assume unconditional equality [Aristotle] |
22562 | Choosing officials by lot is democratic [Aristotle] |
22560 | Popular leaders only arise in democracies that are not in accord with the law [Aristotle] |
2826 | Like water, large numbers of people are harder to corrupt than a few [Aristotle] |
22559 | Democracy is the worst of good constitutions, but the best of bad constitutions [Plato, by Aristotle] |
87 | Democracy is the best constitution for friendship, because it encourages equality [Aristotle] |
2823 | The many may add up to something good, even if they are inferior as individuals [Aristotle] |
141 | A good citizen won't be passive, but will redirect the needs of the state [Plato] |
22576 | No office is permanent in a democracy [Aristotle] |
22533 | If the people are equal in nature, then they should all share in ruling [Aristotle] |
2817 | It is wrong that a worthy officer of state should seek the office [Aristotle] |
22549 | In many cases, the claim that the majority is superior would apply equally to wild beasts [Aristotle] |
22575 | Ultimate democracy is tyranny [Aristotle] |
22531 | We aim to understand the best possible community for free people [Aristotle] |
22589 | Citizens do not just own themselves, but are also parts of the city [Aristotle] |
2131 | Is there anything better for a community than to produce excellent people? [Plato] |
239 | Education in virtue produces citizens who are active but obedient [Plato] |
5260 | Friendship holds communities together, and lawgivers value it more than justice [Aristotle] |
5264 | Friendship is based on a community of sharing [Aristotle] |
22585 | Look at all of the citizens before judging a city to be happy [Aristotle] |
22564 | Community is based on friends, who are equal and similar, and share things [Aristotle] |
22565 | The best communities rely on a large and strong middle class [Aristotle] |
22534 | People care less about what is communal, and more about what is their own [Aristotle] |
22538 | Owning and sharing property communally increases disagreements [Aristotle] |
22536 | There could be private land and public crops, or public land and private crops, or both public [Aristotle] |
22530 | Both women and children should be educated, as this contributes to a city's excellence [Aristotle] |
21358 | Natural slaves are those naturally belonging to another, or who can manage no more than labouring [Aristotle] |
21047 | Aristotle thought slavery is just if it is both necessary and natural [Aristotle, by Sandel] |
20092 | One principle of liberty is to take turns ruling and being ruled [Aristotle] |
262 | Men and women should qualify equally for honours on merit [Plato] |
123 | Do most people like equality because they are second-rate? [Plato] |
1402 | Friendship is impossible between master and slave, even if they are made equal [Plato] |
2833 | Equality is obviously there to help people who do not get priority in the constitution [Aristotle] |
2834 | It is always the weak who want justice and equality, not the strong [Aristotle] |
2830 | We can claim an equal right to aristocratic virtue, as well as to wealth or freedom [Aristotle] |
22569 | The Heraeans replaced election with lot, to thwart campaigning [Aristotle] |
22550 | It is dreadful to neither give a share nor receive a share [Aristotle] |
22568 | Faction is for inferiors to be equal, and equals to become superior [Aristotle] |
124 | Does nature imply that it is right for better people to have greater benefits? [Plato] |
2814 | Phaleas proposed equality of property, provided there is equality of education [Aristotle] |
22540 | Wealth could be quickly leveled by only the rich giving marriage dowries [Aristotle] |
236 | Sound laws achieve the happiness of those who observe them [Plato] |
2828 | Law is intelligence without appetite [Aristotle] |
22537 | Property should be owned privately, but used communally [Aristotle] |
2825 | The good is obviously justice, which benefits the whole community, and involves equality in some sense [Aristotle] |
259 | Justice is granting the equality which unequals deserve [Plato] |
22527 | Justice is the order in a political community [Aristotle] |
22547 | Justice is equality for equals, and inequality for unequals [Aristotle] |
21044 | For Aristotle, debates about justice are debates about the good life [Aristotle, by Sandel] |
23916 | The best cure for mutual injustice is friendship [Aristotle] |
22573 | The virtue of justice may be relative to a particular constitution [Aristotle] |
22556 | Laws that match people's habits are more effective than mere written rules [Aristotle] |
2806 | Man is the worst of all animals when divorced from law and justice [Aristotle] |
2816 | If it is easy to change the laws, that makes them weaker [Aristotle] |
22551 | Correct law should be in control, with rulers only deciding uncertain issues [Aristotle] |
22554 | It is said that we should not stick strictly to written law, as it is too vague [Aristotle] |
2827 | It is preferable that law should rule rather than any single citizen [Aristotle] |
5246 | Natural justice is the same everywhere, and does not (unlike legal justice) depend on acceptance [Aristotle] |
1660 | It is noble to avenge oneself on one's enemies, and not come to terms with them [Aristotle] |
2840 | The whole state should pay for the worship of the gods [Aristotle] |
322 | Intelligence is the result of rational teaching; true opinion can result from irrational persuasion [Plato] |
2811 | A state is plural, and needs education to make it a community [Aristotle] |
22588 | A city has a single end, so education must focus on that, and be communal, not private [Aristotle] |
2847 | The aim of serious childhood play is the amusement of the complete adult [Aristotle] |
11150 | It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain an idea without accepting it [Aristotle] |
331 | Bad governments prevent discussion, and discourage the study of virtue [Plato] |
238 | Children's games should channel their pleasures into adult activity [Plato] |
260 | Control of education is the key office of state, and should go to the best citizen [Plato] |
3037 | Aristotle said the educated were superior to the uneducated as the living are to the dead [Aristotle, by Diog. Laertius] |
2148 | To gain knowledge, turn away from the world of change, and focus on true goodness [Plato] |
2152 | Dialectic is the highest and most important part of the curriculum [Plato] |
257 | Mathematics has the widest application of any subject on the curriculum [Plato] |
2153 | Compulsory intellectual work never remains in the mind [Plato] |
222 | Only a great person can understand the essence of things, and an even greater person can teach it [Plato] |
1638 | Didactic education is hard work and achieves little [Plato] |
4331 | Education is channelling a child's feelings into the right course before it understands why [Plato] |
250 | The best way to educate the young is not to rebuke them, but to set a good example [Plato] |
5150 | Intellectual virtue arises from instruction (and takes time), whereas moral virtue result from habit [Aristotle] |
2842 | Men learn partly by habit, and partly by listening [Aristotle] |
11241 | Wise men aren't instructed; they instruct [Aristotle] |
2844 | Abortions should be procured before the embryo has acquired life and sensation [Aristotle] |
5228 | A suicide embraces death to run away from hardships, rather than because it is a fine deed [Aristotle] |
298 | While sex is very pleasant, it should be in secret, as it looks contemptible [Plato] |
632 | Why are some things destructible and others not? [Aristotle] |
5092 | Nature is a principle of change, so we must understand change first [Aristotle] |
5113 | Nothing natural is disorderly, because nature is responsible for all order [Aristotle] |
310 | The creator of the cosmos had no envy, and so wanted things to be as like himself as possible [Plato] |
311 | The cosmos must be unique, because it resembles the creator, who is unique [Plato] |
5085 | 'Nature' refers to two things - form and matter [Aristotle] |
1740 | Nature does nothing in vain [Aristotle] |
5089 | Nature has purpose, and aims at what is better. Is it coincidence that crops grow when it rains? [Aristotle] |
394 | An unworn sandal is in vain, but nothing in nature is in vain [Aristotle] |
396 | There has to be some goal, and not just movement to infinity [Aristotle] |
2809 | If nature makes everything for a purpose, then plants and animals must have been made for man [Aristotle] |
626 | Everything is arranged around a single purpose [Aristotle] |
275 | Creation is not for you; you exist for the sake of creation [Plato] |
5086 | The nature of a thing is its end and purpose [Aristotle] |
5087 | A thing's purpose is ambiguous, and from one point of view we ourselves are ends [Aristotle] |
5091 | Teeth and crops are predictable, so they cannot be mere chance, but must have a purpose [Aristotle] |
2684 | Aristotle needed to distinguish teleological description from teleological explanation [Irwin on Aristotle] |
5227 | The nature of any given thing is determined by its end [Aristotle] |
5866 | It is folly not to order one's life around some end [Aristotle] |
2800 | The best instruments have one purpose, not many [Aristotle] |
5878 | Eyes could be used for a natural purpose, or for unnatural seeing, or for a non-seeing activity [Aristotle] |
5108 | Is ceasing-to-be unnatural if it happens by force, and natural otherwise? [Aristotle] |
5873 | Each thing's function is its end [Aristotle] |
17858 | Pythagoreans say the whole universe is made of numbers [Aristotle] |
5095 | The heavens seem to be infinite, because we cannot imagine their end [Aristotle] |
5093 | Continuity depends on infinity, because the continuous is infinitely divisible [Aristotle] |
8660 | There are potential infinities (never running out), but actual infinity is incoherent [Aristotle, by Friend] |
601 | Substance must exist, because something must endure during change between opposites [Aristotle] |
16762 | Matter desires form, as female desires male, and ugliness desires beauty [Aristotle] |
13216 | Matter is the limit of points and lines, and must always have quality and form [Aristotle] |
17994 | The primary matter is the substratum for the contraries like hot and cold [Aristotle] |
12058 | Aristotle's matter can become any other kind of matter [Aristotle, by Wiggins] |
10955 | Matter is perceptible (like bronze) or intelligible (like mathematical objects) [Aristotle] |
16590 | Matter is neither a particular thing nor a member of a determinate category [Aristotle] |
12001 | Aristotle says matter is a lesser substance, rather than wholly denying that it is a substance [Aristotle, by Kung] |
12299 | Aristotle had a hierarchical conception of matter [Aristotle, by Fine,K] |
15771 | Primary matter is what characterises other stuffs, and it has no distinct identity [Aristotle] |
12868 | Ultimate matter is discredited, as Aristotle merged substratum of change with bearer of properties [Simons on Aristotle] |
15954 | Aristotle may only have believed in prime matter because his elements were immutable [Aristotle, by Alexander,P] |
16099 | The traditional view of Aristotle is God (actual form) at top and prime matter (potential matter) at bottom [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
13224 | There couldn't be just one element, which was both water and air at the same time [Aristotle] |
225 | The unlimited has no shape and is endless [Plato] |
231 | Everything partakes of the One in some way [Plato] |
2062 | The only movement possible for the One is in space or in alteration [Plato] |
616 | It doesn't explain the world to say it was originally all one. How did it acquire diversity? [Aristotle] |
233 | Some things do not partake of the One [Plato] |
17464 | When Aristotle's elements compound they are stable, so why would they ever separate? [Weisberg/Needham/Hendry on Aristotle] |
16102 | Aether moves in circles and is imperishable; the four elements perish, and move in straight lines [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
17463 | An element is what bodies are analysed into, and won't itself divide into something else [Aristotle] |
16594 | The Four Elements must change into one another, or else alteration is impossible [Aristotle] |
13223 | Fire is hot and dry; Air is hot and moist; Water is cold and moist; Earth is cold and dry [Aristotle] |
16098 | I claim that Aristotle's foundation is the four elements, and not wholly potential prime matter [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
325 | We must consider the four basic shapes as too small to see, only becoming visible in large numbers [Plato] |
13210 | Wood is potentially divided through and through, so what is there in the wood besides the division? [Aristotle] |
13220 | Bodies are endlessly divisible [Aristotle] |
13211 | If a body is endlessly divided, is it reduced to nothing - then reassembled from nothing? [Aristotle] |
10952 | Unusual kinds like mule are just a combination of two kinds [Aristotle] |
12265 | All water is the same, because of a certain similarity [Aristotle] |
12375 | Whatever holds of a kind intrinsically holds of it necessarily [Aristotle] |
327 | There are two types of cause, the necessary and the divine [Plato] |
13156 | Fancy being unable to distinguish a cause from its necessary background conditions! [Plato] |
11252 | The 'form' of a thing explains why the matter constitutes that particular thing [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11253 | A 'material' cause/explanation is the form of whatever is the source [Aristotle, by Politis] |
5219 | Types of cause are nature, necessity and chance, and mind and human agency [Aristotle] |
13107 | Causes produce a few things in their own right, and innumerable things coincidentally [Aristotle] |
8332 | The four causes are the material, the form, the source, and the end [Aristotle] |
561 | Is there cause outside matter, and can it be separated, and is it one or many? [Aristotle] |
5861 | People assume events cause what follows them [Aristotle] |
588 | We exercise to be fit, but need fitness to exercise [Aristotle] |
634 | Pure Forms and numbers can't cause anything, and especially not movement [Aristotle] |
14543 | When a power and its object meet in the right conditions, an action necessarily follows [Aristotle] |
11043 | It is not possible for fire to be cold or snow black [Aristotle] |
9787 | Scientists must know the essential attributes of the things they study [Aristotle] |
20063 | Motion fulfils potentiality [Aristotle] |
1739 | If all movement is either pushing or pulling, there must be a still point in between where it all starts [Aristotle] |
5114 | If movement can arise within an animal, why can't it also arise in the universe? [Aristotle] |
5116 | When there is unnatural movement (e.g. fire going downwards) the cause is obvious [Aristotle] |
399 | If the more you raise some earth the faster it moves, why does the whole earth not move? [Aristotle] |
24044 | Movement can be intrinsic (like a ship) or relative (like its sailors) [Aristotle] |
24045 | Movement is spatial, alteration, withering or growth [Aristotle] |
1738 | Practical reason is based on desire, so desire must be the ultimate producer of movement [Aristotle] |
24064 | If something is pushed, it pushes back [Aristotle] |
1696 | Change goes from possession to loss (as in baldness), but not the other way round [Aristotle] |
20918 | Void is a kind of place, so it can't explain place [Aristotle] |
5099 | The universe as a whole is not anywhere [Aristotle] |
5097 | If everything has a place, this causes an infinite regress, because each place must have place [Aristotle] |
5098 | Place is not shape, or matter, or extension between limits; it is the limits of a body [Aristotle] |
13228 | There is no time without movement [Aristotle] |
20920 | If there were many cosmoses, each would have its own time, giving many times [Aristotle] |
5106 | Would there be time if there were no mind? [Aristotle] |
22967 | It is unclear whether time depends on the existence of soul [Aristotle] |
8590 | Time does not exist without change [Aristotle] |
22965 | Time measures rest, as well as change [Aristotle] |
22885 | For Aristotle time is not a process but a means for measuring processes [Aristotle, by Bardon] |
22959 | Time is not change, but the number we associate with change [Aristotle] |
22964 | Change only exists in time through its being temporally measure [Aristotle] |
5104 | Time is an aspect of change [Aristotle] |
1702 | Things may be necessary once they occur, but not be unconditionally necessary [Aristotle] |
22956 | How can time exist, when it is composed of what has ceased to be and is yet to be? [Aristotle] |
5102 | If all of time has either ceased to exist, or has not yet happened, maybe time does not exist [Aristotle] |
314 | Heavenly movements gave us the idea of time, and caused us to inquire about the heavens [Plato] |
5103 | Time is not change, but requires change in our minds to be noticed [Aristotle] |
22961 | The present moment is obviously a necessary feature of time [Aristotle] |
22916 | Unlike time, change goes at different rates, and is usually localised [Aristotle, by Le Poidevin] |
1526 | Almost everyone except Plato thinks that time could not have been generated [Plato, by Aristotle] |
617 | It is hard to see how either time or movement could come into existence or be destroyed [Aristotle] |
312 | Time came into existence with the heavens, so that there will be a time when they can be dissolved [Plato] |
16693 | Time has parts, but the now is not one of them, and time is not composed of nows [Aristotle] |
22958 | Nows can't be linked together, any more than points on a line [Aristotle] |
22968 | Circular motion is the most obvious measure of time, and especially the celestial sphere [Aristotle] |
22963 | We measure change by time, and time by change, as they are interdefined [Aristotle] |
22966 | The present moment is a link (of past to future), and also a limit (of past and of future) [Aristotle] |
22957 | We can't tell whether the changing present moment is one thing, or a succession of things [Aristotle] |
369 | If the Earth is spherical and in the centre, it is kept in place by universal symmetry, not by force [Plato] |
309 | Clearly the world is good, so its maker must have been concerned with the eternal, not with change [Plato] |
402 | The Earth must be spherical, because it casts a convex shadow on the moon [Aristotle] |
403 | The earth must be round and of limited size, because moving north or south makes different stars visible [Aristotle] |
5083 | Do things come to be from what is, or from what is not? Both seem problematical. [Aristotle] |
16595 | If each thing can cease to be, why hasn't absolutely everything ceased to be long ago? [Aristotle] |
148 | If the prime origin is destroyed, it will not come into being again out of anything [Plato] |
308 | If the cosmos is an object of perception then it must be continually changing [Plato] |
613 | Even if the world is caused by fate, mind and nature are still prior causes [Aristotle] |
619 | Something which both moves and is moved is intermediate, so it follows that there must be an unmoved mover [Aristotle] |
1498 | Everyone agrees that the world had a beginning, but thinkers disagree over whether it will end [Aristotle] |
273 | Movement is transmitted through everything, and it must have started with self-generated motion [Plato] |
620 | The first mover is necessary, and because it is necessary it is good [Aristotle] |
395 | It seems possible that there exists a limited number of other worlds apart from this one [Aristotle] |
23302 | Plants have far less life than animals, but more life than other corporeal entities [Aristotle] |
24063 | What is born has growth, a prime, and a withering away [Aristotle] |
23301 | There is a gradual proceeding from the inanimate to animals, with no clear borderlines [Aristotle] |
13779 | The natural offspring of a lion is called a 'lion' (but what about the offspring of a king?) [Plato] |
13783 | Even the gods love play [Plato] |
279 | Only divine things can always stay the same, and bodies are not like that [Plato] |
5119 | The source of all movement must be indivisible and have no magnitude [Aristotle] |
2836 | God is not blessed and happy because of external goods, but because of his own nature [Aristotle] |
622 | There must a source of movement which is eternal, indivisible and without magnitude [Aristotle] |
175 | Gods are not lovers of wisdom, because they are already wise [Plato] |
152 | The mind of God is fully satisfied and happy with a vision of reality and truth [Plato] |
2630 | If Plato's God is immaterial, he will lack consciousness, wisdom, pleasure and movement, which are essential to him [Cicero on Plato] |
7603 | God is not a creator (involving time and change) and is not concerned with the inferior universe [Aristotle, by Armstrong,K] |
336 | Is what is pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because they love it? (the 'Euthyphro Question') [Plato] |
337 | It seems that the gods love things because they are pious, rather than making them pious by loving them [Plato] |
2058 | God must be the epitome of goodness, and we can only approach a divine state by being as good as possible [Plato] |
8004 | In 'The Laws', to obey the law is to be obey god [Plato, by MacIntyre] |
16165 | For Aristotle God is defined in an axiom, for which there is no proof [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
234 | We couldn't discuss the non-existence of the One without knowledge of it [Plato] |
13227 | Being is better than not-being [Aristotle] |
12278 | 'Being' and 'oneness' are predicated of everything which exists [Aristotle] |
1688 | Properties must be proved, but not essence; but existents are not a kind, so existence isn't part of essence [Aristotle] |
21257 | Self-generating motion is clearly superior to all other kinds of motion [Plato] |
21258 | The only possible beginning for the endless motions of reality is something self-generated [Plato] |
21261 | Self-moving soul has to be the oldest thing there is [Plato] |
274 | Soul must be the cause of all the opposites, such as good and evil or beauty and ugliness [Plato] |
21263 | If all the motions of nature reflect calculations of reason, then the best kind of soul must direct it [Plato] |
13226 | An Order controls all things [Aristotle] |
610 | The world can't be arranged at all if there is nothing eternal and separate [Aristotle] |
14 | If the gods are non-existent or indifferent, why bother to deceive them? [Plato] |
150 | We cannot conceive of God, so we have to think of Him as an immortal version of ourselves [Plato] |
2802 | Men imagine gods to be of human shape, with a human lifestyle [Aristotle] |
149 | There isn't a single reason for positing the existence of immortal beings [Plato] |
278 | If astronomical movements are seen as necessary instead of by divine will, this leads to atheism [Plato] |
21265 | The heavens must be full of gods, controlling nature either externally or from within [Plato] |
22729 | The concepts of gods arose from observing the soul, and the cosmos [Aristotle, by Sext.Empiricus] |
12097 | There are as many eternal unmovable substances as there are movements of the stars [Aristotle] |
21262 | There must be at least two souls controlling the cosmos, one doing good, the other the opposite [Plato] |
363 | Whether the soul pre-exists our body depends on whether it contains the ultimate standard of reality [Plato] |
146 | Soul is always in motion, so it must be self-moving and immortal [Plato] |
24037 | We all assume immortality is impossible [Aristotle] |
2165 | Something is unlikely to be immortal if it is imperfectly made from diverse parts [Plato] |
13 | Is the supreme reward for virtue to be drunk for eternity? [Plato] |
2057 | There must always be some force of evil ranged against good [Plato] |
2120 | God is responsible for the good things, but we must look elsewhere for the cause of the bad things [Plato] |