Combining Texts

Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Doing Without Concepts' and 'Vagueness'

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2 ideas

1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 4. Divisions of Philosophy
Three branches of philosophy: first logic, second ethics, third physics (which ends with theology) [Chrysippus]
     Full Idea: There are three kinds of philosophical theorems, logical, ethical, and physical; of these the logic should be placed first, ethics second, and physics third (and theology is the final topic in physics).
     From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1035a
     A reaction: [in his lost 'On Lives' Bk 4] 'Theology is the final topic in physics'! That should create a stir in theology departments. Is this an order of study, or of importance? You come to theology right at the end of your studies.
1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 5. Aims of Philosophy / a. Philosophy as worldly
Philosophy is empty if it does not in some way depend on matters of fact [Machery]
     Full Idea: Save, maybe, for purely formal (e.g. logical) theories, philosophical claims whose correctness does not depend, however indirectly, on matters of fact are empty: they are neither true nor false.
     From: Edouard Machery (Doing Without Concepts [2009], Intro)
     A reaction: I subscribe to this view. I'd even say that logic is empty if it is not answerable to the facts. The facts are nature, so this is a naturalistic manifesto.