52 ideas
| 10794 | The nominalist is tied by standard semantics to first-order, denying higher-order abstracta [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10788 | Nominalists see proper names as a main vehicle of reference [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10786 | Anything which refers tends to be called a 'name', even if it isn't a noun [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10799 | Nominalists should quantify existentially at first-order, and substitutionally when higher [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10790 | Quantifiers are needed to refer to infinitely many objects [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10791 | Substitutional semantics has no domain of objects, but place-markers for substitutions [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10785 | Maybe a substitutional semantics for quantification lends itself to nominalism [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10798 | A true universal sentence might be substitutionally refuted, by an unnamed denumerable object [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10795 | Substitutional language has no ontology, and is just a way of speaking [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10787 | Is being just referent of the verb 'to be'? [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10789 | Nominalists say predication is relations between individuals, or deny that it refers [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10796 | If objects are thoughts, aren't we back to psychologism? [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 11181 | Aristotelian essentialism involves a 'natural' or 'causal' interpretation of modal operators [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 11184 | Aristotelian essentialism is about shared properties, individuating essentialism about distinctive properties [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 11180 | Essentialist sentences are not theorems of modal logic, and can even be false [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 11186 | 'Essentially' won't replace 'necessarily' for vacuous properties like snub-nosed or self-identical [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 11185 | 'Is essentially' has a different meaning from 'is necessarily', as they often cannot be substituted [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 11182 | If essences are objects with only essential properties, they are elusive in possible worlds [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10797 | Substitutivity won't fix identity, because expressions may be substitutable, but not refer at all [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 11183 | The use of possible worlds is to sort properties (not to individuate objects) [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 11187 | In possible worlds, names are just neutral unvarying pegs for truths and predicates [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 17405 | If a theory can be fudged, so can observations [Scerri] |
| 17397 | The periodic system is the big counterexample to Kuhn's theory of revolutionary science [Scerri] |
| 17393 | Scientists eventually seek underlying explanations for every pattern [Scerri] |
| 17403 | The periodic table suggests accommodation to facts rates above prediction [Scerri] |
| 22595 | Liberty is the triumph of the individual, over both despotic government and enslaving majorities [Constant] |
| 22597 | Minority rights are everyone's rights, because we all have turns in the minority [Constant] |
| 17394 | Natural kinds are what are differentiated by nature, and not just by us [Scerri] |
| 17421 | If elements are natural kinds, might the groups of the periodic table also be natural kinds? [Scerri] |
| 11189 | Dispositional essences are special, as if an object loses them they cease to exist [Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 17396 | The colour of gold is best explained by relativistic effects due to fast-moving inner-shell electrons [Scerri] |
| 17420 | The stability of nuclei can be estimated through their binding energy [Scerri] |
| 17411 | If all elements are multiples of one (of hydrogen), that suggests once again that matter is unified [Scerri] |
| 17409 | Does radioactivity show that only physics can explain chemistry? [Scerri] |
| 17392 | How can poisonous elements survive in the nutritious compound they compose? [Scerri] |
| 17391 | Periodicity and bonding are the two big ideas in chemistry [Scerri] |
| 17404 | Chemistry does not work from general principles, but by careful induction from large amounts of data [Scerri] |
| 17407 | The electron is the main source of chemical properties [Scerri] |
| 17415 | A big chemistry idea is that covalent bonds are shared electrons, not transfer of electrons [Scerri] |
| 17418 | It is now thought that all the elements have literally evolved from hydrogen [Scerri] |
| 17398 | 19th C views said elements survived abstractly in compounds, but also as 'material ingredients' [Scerri] |
| 17395 | Elements were ordered by equivalent weight; later by atomic weight; finally by atomic number [Scerri] |
| 17406 | Moseley, using X-rays, showed that atomic number ordered better than atomic weight [Scerri] |
| 17408 | Some suggested basing the new periodic table on isotopes, not elements [Scerri] |
| 17413 | Elements in the table are grouped by having the same number of outer-shell electrons [Scerri] |
| 17416 | Orthodoxy says the periodic table is explained by quantum mechanics [Scerri] |
| 17417 | To explain the table, quantum mechanics still needs to explain order of shell filling [Scerri] |
| 17419 | Since 99.96% of the universe is hydrogen and helium, the periodic table hardly matters [Scerri] |
| 17414 | Pauli explained the electron shells, but not the lengths of the periods in the table [Scerri] |
| 17410 | Moseley showed the elements progress in units, and thereby clearly identified the gaps [Scerri] |
| 17412 | Elements are placed in the table by the number of positive charges - the atomic number [Scerri] |
| 17422 | The best classification needs the deepest and most general principles of the atoms [Scerri] |