156 ideas
| 19579 | The history of philosophy is just experiments in how to do philosophy [Novalis] |
| 19583 | Philosophy only begins when it studies itself [Novalis] |
| 22026 | Philosophy is homesickness - the urge to be at home everywhere [Novalis] |
| 19588 | The highest aim of philosophy is to combine all philosophies into a unity [Novalis] |
| 19598 | Philosophy relies on our whole system of learning, and can thus never be complete [Novalis] |
| 19586 | Philosophers feed on problems, hoping they are digestible, and spiced with paradox [Novalis] |
| 12667 | Metaphysics aims at the simplest explanation, without regard to testability [Ellis] |
| 19587 | Philosophy aims to produce a priori an absolute and artistic world system [Novalis] |
| 13567 | Ontology should give insight into or an explanation of the world revealed by science [Ellis] |
| 5486 | Essentialism says metaphysics can't be done by analysing unreliable language [Ellis] |
| 19574 | If man sacrifices truth he sacrifices himself, by acting against his own convictions [Novalis] |
| 19571 | Delusion and truth differ in their life functions [Novalis] |
| 13604 | Real possibility and necessity has the logic of S5, which links equivalence classes of worlds of the same kind [Ellis] |
| 12666 | We can base logic on acceptability, and abandon the Fregean account by truth-preservation [Ellis] |
| 19597 | Logic (the theory of relations) should be applied to mathematics [Novalis] |
| 13606 | Humean conceptions of reality drive the adoption of extensional logic [Ellis] |
| 19581 | A problem is a solid mass, which the mind must break up [Novalis] |
| 1553 | No perceptible object is truly straight or curved [Protagoras] |
| 19584 | Whoever first counted to two must have seen the possibility of infinite counting [Novalis] |
| 12688 | Mathematics is the formal study of the categorical dimensions of things [Ellis] |
| 22025 | Novalis thought self-consciousness cannot disclose 'being', because we are temporal creatures [Novalis, by Pinkard] |
| 12683 | Objects and substances are a subcategory of the natural kinds of processes [Ellis] |
| 12670 | A physical event is any change of distribution of energy [Ellis] |
| 13584 | The extension of a property is a contingent fact, so cannot be the essence of the property [Ellis] |
| 5468 | Properties are 'dispositional', or 'categorical' (the latter as 'block' or 'intrinsic' structures) [Ellis, by PG] |
| 13587 | There is no property of 'fragility', as things are each fragile in a distinctive way [Ellis] |
| 12673 | Physical properties are those relevant to how a physical system might act [Ellis] |
| 13577 | Typical 'categorical' properties are spatio-temporal, such as shape [Ellis] |
| 9436 | The property of 'being an electron' is not of anything, and only electrons could have it [Ellis] |
| 5469 | The passive view of nature says categorical properties are basic, but others say dispositions [Ellis] |
| 12665 | I support categorical properties, although most people only want causal powers [Ellis] |
| 12682 | Essentialism needs categorical properties (spatiotemporal and numerical relations) and dispositions [Ellis] |
| 12684 | Spatial, temporal and numerical relations have causal roles, without being causal [Ellis] |
| 13582 | 'Being a methane molecule' is not a property - it is just a predicate [Ellis] |
| 12672 | Properties and relations are discovered, so they can't be mere sets of individuals [Ellis] |
| 5456 | Redness is not a property as it is not mind-independent [Ellis] |
| 18398 | Space, time, and some other basics, are not causal powers [Ellis] |
| 13580 | Causal powers must necessarily act the way they do [Ellis] |
| 13598 | Causal powers are often directional (e.g. centripetal, centrifugal, circulatory) [Ellis] |
| 12676 | Causal powers can't rest on things which lack causal power [Ellis] |
| 13568 | Basic powers may not be explained by structure, if at the bottom level there is no structure [Ellis] |
| 13586 | Maybe dispositions can be explained by intrinsic properties or structures [Ellis] |
| 5481 | Properties have powers; they aren't just ways for logicians to classify objects [Ellis] |
| 23781 | Categoricals exist to influence powers. Such as structures, orientations and magnitudes [Ellis, by Williams,NE] |
| 13585 | The most fundamental properties of nature (mass, charge, spin ...) all seem to be dispositions [Ellis] |
| 5458 | Nearly all fundamental properties of physics are dispositional [Ellis] |
| 13596 | A causal power is a disposition to produce forces [Ellis] |
| 13599 | Powers are dispositions of the essences of kinds that involve them in causation [Ellis] |
| 12686 | Causal powers are a proper subset of the dispositional properties [Ellis] |
| 13572 | There are 'substantive' (objects of some kind), 'dynamic' (events of some kind) and 'property' universals [Ellis] |
| 13573 | Universals are all types of natural kind [Ellis] |
| 12685 | Categorical properties depend only on the structures they represent [Ellis] |
| 5443 | Kripke and others have made essentialism once again respectable [Ellis] |
| 5444 | 'Individual essences' fix a particular individual, and 'kind essences' fix the kind it belongs to [Ellis] |
| 19575 | Refinement of senses increasingly distinguishes individuals [Novalis] |
| 13571 | Scientific essentialism doesn't really need Kripkean individual essences [Ellis] |
| 12679 | A real essence is a kind's distinctive properties [Ellis] |
| 5462 | Essential properties are usually quantitatively determinate [Ellis] |
| 5448 | 'Real essence' makes it what it is; 'nominal essence' makes us categorise it a certain way [Ellis] |
| 13578 | The old idea that identity depends on essence and behaviour is rejected by the empiricists [Ellis] |
| 5477 | One thing can look like something else, without being the something else [Ellis] |
| 13576 | Necessities are distinguished by their grounds, not their different modalities [Ellis] |
| 12668 | Metaphysical necessity holds between things in the world and things they make true [Ellis] |
| 5479 | Scientific essentialists say science should define the limits of the possible [Ellis] |
| 12687 | Metaphysical necessities are those depending on the essential nature of things [Ellis] |
| 5483 | Essentialists deny possible worlds, and say possibilities are what is compatible with the actual world [Ellis] |
| 13570 | Individual essences necessitate that individual; natural kind essences necessitate kind membership [Ellis] |
| 5447 | Metaphysical necessities are true in virtue of the essences of things [Ellis] |
| 5476 | Essentialists say natural laws are in a new category: necessary a posteriori [Ellis] |
| 5478 | Imagination tests what is possible for all we know, not true possibility [Ellis] |
| 5482 | Possible worlds realism is only needed to give truth conditions for modals and conditionals [Ellis] |
| 1549 | Everything that exists consists in being perceived [Protagoras] |
| 22067 | Poetry is true idealism, and the self-consciousness of the universe [Novalis] |
| 5453 | Essentialists mostly accept the primary/secondary qualities distinction [Ellis] |
| 5466 | Primary qualities are number, figure, size, texture, motion, configuration, impenetrability and (?) mass [Ellis] |
| 19572 | Experiences tests reason, and reason tests experience [Novalis] |
| 19590 | Empiricists are passive thinkers, given their philosophy by the external world and fate [Novalis] |
| 1545 | Protagoras was the first to claim that there are two contradictory arguments about everything [Protagoras, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 1547 | Man is the measure of all things - of things that are, and of things that are not [Protagoras] |
| 3305 | There is no more purely metaphysical doctrine than Protagorean relativism [Benardete,JA on Protagoras] |
| 3313 | If my hot wind is your cold wind, then wind is neither hot nor cold, and so not as cold as itself [Benardete,JA on Protagoras] |
| 3317 | You can only state the problem of the relative warmth of an object by agreeing on the underlying object [Benardete,JA on Protagoras] |
| 247 | God is "the measure of all things", more than any man [Plato on Protagoras] |
| 606 | Protagoras absurdly thought that the knowing or perceiving man is 'the measure of all things' [Aristotle on Protagoras] |
| 612 | Relativists think if you poke your eye and see double, there must be two things [Aristotle on Protagoras] |
| 19594 | General statements about nature are not valid [Novalis] |
| 12669 | Science aims to explain things, not just describe them [Ellis] |
| 13607 | If events are unconnected, then induction cannot be solved [Ellis] |
| 5485 | Emeralds are naturally green, and only an external force could turn them blue [Ellis] |
| 13597 | Good explanations unify [Ellis] |
| 5484 | Essentialists don't infer from some to all, but from essences to necessary behaviour [Ellis] |
| 13601 | Explanations of particular events are not essentialist, as they don't reveal essential structures [Ellis] |
| 13569 | To give essentialist explanations there have to be natural kinds [Ellis] |
| 19591 | Desire for perfection is an illness, if it turns against what is imperfect [Novalis] |
| 13600 | The point of models in theories is not to idealise, but to focus on what is essential [Ellis] |
| 19596 | The whole body is involved in the formation of thoughts [Novalis] |
| 19573 | The seat of the soul is where our inner and outer worlds interpenetrate [Novalis] |
| 19577 | Everything is a chaotic unity, then we abstract, then we reunify the world into a free alliance [Novalis] |
| 5457 | Predicates assert properties, values, denials, relations, conventions, existence and fabrications [Ellis, by PG] |
| 19585 | Every person has his own language [Novalis] |
| 5488 | Regularity theories of causation cannot give an account of human agency [Ellis] |
| 5489 | Humans have variable dispositions, and also power to change their dispositions [Ellis] |
| 19578 | Only self-illuminated perfect individuals are beautiful [Novalis] |
| 19582 | Morality and philosophy are mutually dependent [Novalis] |
| 5490 | Essentialism fits in with Darwinism, but not with extreme politics of left or right [Ellis] |
| 6016 | Early sophists thought convention improved nature; later they said nature was diminished by it [Protagoras, by Miller,FD] |
| 1580 | For Protagoras the only bad behaviour is that which interferes with social harmony [Protagoras, by Roochnik] |
| 205 | Protagoras contradicts himself by saying virtue is teachable, but then that it is not knowledge [Plato on Protagoras] |
| 22027 | Life isn't given to us like a novel - we write the novel [Novalis] |
| 19589 | The whole point of a monarch is that we accept them as a higher-born, ideal person [Novalis] |
| 1659 | Protagoras seems to have made the huge move of separating punishment from revenge [Protagoras, by Vlastos] |
| 532 | Successful education must go deep into the soul [Protagoras] |
| 1552 | He spent public money on education, as it benefits the individual and the state [Protagoras, by Diodorus of Sicily] |
| 19580 | If the pupil really yearns for the truth, they only need a hint [Novalis] |
| 19593 | Persons are shaped by a life history; splendid persons are shaped by world history [Novalis] |
| 19595 | Nature is a whole, and its individual parts cannot be wholly understood [Novalis] |
| 19592 | The basic relations of nature are musical [Novalis] |
| 5472 | Natural kinds are of objects/substances, or events/processes, or intrinsic natures [Ellis] |
| 6613 | The natural kinds are objects, processes and properties/relations [Ellis] |
| 12681 | There are natural kinds of processes [Ellis] |
| 13583 | There might be uninstantiated natural kinds, such as transuranic elements which have never occurred [Ellis] |
| 12680 | Natural kind structures go right down to the bottom level [Ellis] |
| 13574 | Natural kinds are distinguished by resting on essences [Ellis] |
| 5471 | Essentialism says natural kinds are fundamental to nature, and determine the laws [Ellis] |
| 5446 | For essentialists two members of a natural kind must be identical [Ellis] |
| 5480 | The whole of our world is a natural kind, so all worlds like it necessarily have the same laws [Ellis] |
| 13575 | If there are borderline cases between natural kinds, that makes them superficial [Ellis] |
| 5445 | Essentialists regard inanimate objects as genuine causal agents [Ellis] |
| 5463 | Essentialists believe causation is necessary, resulting from dispositions and circumstances [Ellis] |
| 5491 | A general theory of causation is only possible in an area if natural kinds are involved [Ellis] |
| 13595 | Laws don't exist in the world; they are true of the world [Ellis] |
| 5442 | For 'passivists' behaviour is imposed on things from outside [Ellis] |
| 5473 | The laws of nature imitate the hierarchy of natural kinds [Ellis] |
| 5474 | Laws of nature tend to describe ideal things, or ideal circumstances [Ellis] |
| 5475 | We must explain the necessity, idealisation, ontology and structure of natural laws [Ellis] |
| 6616 | Least action is not a causal law, but a 'global law', describing a global essence [Ellis] |
| 12675 | Laws of nature are just descriptions of how things are disposed to behave [Ellis] |
| 5460 | Causal relations cannot be reduced to regularities, as they could occur just once [Ellis] |
| 13566 | A proton must have its causal role, because without it it wouldn't be a proton [Ellis] |
| 13579 | What is most distinctive of scientific essentialism is regarding processes as natural kinds [Ellis] |
| 13581 | Scientific essentialism is more concerned with explanation than with identity (Locke, not Kripke) [Ellis] |
| 13594 | The ontological fundamentals are dispositions, and also categorical (spatio-temporal and structural) properties [Ellis] |
| 5459 | Essentialists say dispositions are basic, rather than supervenient on matter and natural laws [Ellis] |
| 5461 | The essence of uranium is its atomic number and its electron shell [Ellis] |
| 6615 | A species requires a genus, and its essence includes the essence of the genus [Ellis] |
| 13603 | A primary aim of science is to show the limits of the possible [Ellis] |
| 5464 | For essentialists, laws of nature are metaphysically necessary, being based on essences of natural kinds [Ellis] |
| 6614 | A hierarchy of natural kinds is elaborate ontology, but needed to explain natural laws [Ellis] |
| 5487 | Essentialism requires a clear separation of semantics, epistemology and ontology [Ellis] |
| 6612 | Without general principles, we couldn't predict the behaviour of dispositional properties [Ellis] |
| 12671 | I deny forces as entities that intervene in causation, but are not themselves causal [Ellis] |
| 12674 | Energy is the key multi-valued property, vital to scientific realism [Ellis] |
| 12689 | Simultaneity can be temporal equidistance from the Big Bang [Ellis] |
| 12690 | The present is the collapse of the light wavefront from the Big Bang [Ellis] |
| 1551 | He said he didn't know whether there are gods - but this is the same as atheism [Diogenes of Oen. on Protagoras] |
| 19576 | Religion needs an intermediary, because none of us can connect directly to a godhead [Novalis] |