more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
We should make no assertion about the whole when our contact is with the parts.
Gist of Idea
We should say nothing of the whole if our contact is with the parts
Source
report of Epicurus (fragments/reports [c.289 BCE]) by Plutarch - 74: Reply to Colotes 1109e
Book Ref
Plutarch: 'Moralia - vol 14', ed/tr. Einarson,B. /De Lacy P.H. [Harvard Loeb 1967], p.203
| 648 | Socrates began the quest for something universal with his definitions, but he didn't make them separate [Socrates, by Aristotle] |
| 166 | A speaker should be able to divide a subject, right down to the limits of divisibility [Plato] |
| 16123 | Whenever you perceive a community of things, you should also hunt out differences in the group [Plato] |
| 2083 | Either a syllable is its letters (making parts as knowable as whole) or it isn't (meaning it has no parts) [Plato] |
| 2086 | Understanding mainly involves knowing the elements, not their combinations [Plato] |
| 12274 | Begin examination with basics, and subdivide till you can go no further [Aristotle] |
| 1484 | We should say nothing of the whole if our contact is with the parts [Epicurus, by Plutarch] |
| 1887 | You cannot divide anything into many parts, because after the first division you are no longer dividing the original [Sext.Empiricus] |
| 8014 | Resolve a complex into simple elements, then reconstruct the complex by using them [Hobbes, by MacIntyre] |
| 13099 | Analysing right down to primitive concepts seems beyond our powers [Leibniz] |