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Single Idea 3407

[filed under theme 26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 2. Types of Laws ]

Full Idea

Some laws are held to be 'strict', and others involve a 'ceteris paribus' clause.

Gist of Idea

Laws are either 'strict', or they involve a 'ceteris paribus' clause

Source

Jaegwon Kim (Philosophy of Mind [1996], p.143)

Book Ref

Kim,Jaegwon: 'Philosophy of Mind' [Westview 1998], p.143


The 11 ideas with the same theme [possibility divisions of laws of nature into types]:

Seven theories in science: mechanics, heat, electricity, quantum, particles, relativity, life [Heisenberg, by PG]
Some laws are causal (Ohm's Law), but others are conceptual principles (conservation of energy) [Wright,GHv]
Oaken conditional laws, Iron universal laws, and Steel necessary laws [Armstrong, by PG]
Least action is not a causal law, but a 'global law', describing a global essence [Ellis]
Laws can come from data, from theory, from imagination and concepts, or from procedures [Harré]
Are laws of nature about events, or types and universals, or dispositions, or all three? [Harré]
Are laws about what has or might happen, or do they also cover all the possibilities? [Harré]
Laws are either 'strict', or they involve a 'ceteris paribus' clause [Kim]
There are fundamental explanatory laws (false!), and phenomenological laws (regularities) [Cartwright,N, by Bird]
Laws of appearances are 'phenomenological'; laws of reality are 'theoretical' [Cartwright,N]
Laws are either disposition regularities, or relations between properties [Bird]