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Single Idea 8553

[filed under theme 26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 8. Scientific Essentialism / d. Knowing essences ]

Full Idea

There is a prima facie case for saying that the immutability of the causal potentialities of a property implies their essentiality. ...If they cannot vary across time, they also cannot vary across possible worlds.

Gist of Idea

It looks as if the immutability of the powers of a property imply essentiality

Source

Sydney Shoemaker (Causality and Properties [1980], §05)

Book Ref

Shoemaker,Sydney: 'Identity, Cause and Mind' [OUP 2003], p.217

A Reaction

This is only the beginning of scientific essentialism, but one of the targets is to save the phenomena. It is also involves unimaginability (of different powers from a given property) implying necessity.

The 15 ideas with the same theme [whether we can know essences, and if so, how]:

9787 Scientists must know the essential attributes of the things they study [Aristotle]
16745 No one even knows the nature and properties of a fly - why it has that colour, or so many feet [Bacon,R]
7713 We identify substances by supposing that groups of sensations arise from an essence [Locke]
12545 Other spirits may exceed us in knowledge, by knowing the inward constitution of things [Locke]
17968 By digging deeper into the axioms we approach the essence of sciences, and unity of knowedge [Hilbert]
12310 Real essences are scientifically knowable, but so are non-essential properties [Copi]
6612 Without general principles, we couldn't predict the behaviour of dispositional properties [Ellis]
5487 Essentialism requires a clear separation of semantics, epistemology and ontology [Ellis]
8553 It looks as if the immutability of the powers of a property imply essentiality [Shoemaker]
4965 Science searches basic structures in search of essences [Kripke]
21219 Find the essence by varying an object, to see what remains invariable [Velarde-Mayol]
14307 Some dispositions are so far unknown, until we learn how to manifest them [Mumford]
9437 To distinguish accidental from essential properties, we must include possible members of kinds [Mumford]
15704 Essentialism starts from richly structured categories, leading to a search for underlying properties [Gelman]
6789 If flame colour is characteristic of a metal, that is an empirical claim needing justification [Bird]