display all the ideas for this combination of texts
6 ideas
24047 | An account is either a definition or a demonstration [Aristotle] |
Full Idea: Every account is either a definition or a demonstration. | |
From: Aristotle (De Anima [c.329 BCE], 407a24) | |
A reaction: That is, it is either a summary of the thing's essential nature, or it is a proof of some natural fact, starting from first principles. |
4643 | The Principle of Sufficient Reason does not presuppose that all explanations will be causal explanations [Baggini /Fosl] |
Full Idea: The Principle of Sufficient Reason does not presuppose that all explanations will be causal explanations. | |
From: J Baggini / PS Fosl (The Philosopher's Toolkit [2003], §3.28) | |
A reaction: This sounds a reasonable note of caution, but doesn't carry much weight unless some type of non-causal reason can be envisaged. God's free will? Our free will? The laws of causation? |
4633 | You cannot rationally deny the principle of non-contradiction, because all reasoning requires it [Baggini /Fosl] |
Full Idea: Anyone who denies the principle of non-contradiction simultaneously affirms it; it cannot be rationally criticised, because it is presupposed by all rationality. | |
From: J Baggini / PS Fosl (The Philosopher's Toolkit [2003], §1.12) | |
A reaction: Nietzsche certainly wasn't afraid to ask why we should reject something because it is a contradiction. The 'logic of personal advantage' might allow logical contradictions. |
24052 | From one thing alone we can infer its contrary [Aristotle] |
Full Idea: One member of a pair of contraries is sufficient to discern both itself and its opposite. | |
From: Aristotle (De Anima [c.329 BCE], 411a02) | |
A reaction: This obviously requires prior knowledge of what the opposite is. He says you can infer the crooked from the straight. You can hardly use light in isolation to infer dark [see DA 418b17]. What's the opposite of a pig? |
4635 | Dialectic aims at unified truth, unlike analysis, which divides into parts [Baggini /Fosl] |
Full Idea: Dialectic can be said to aim at wholeness or unity, while 'analytic' thinking divides that with which it deals into parts. | |
From: J Baggini / PS Fosl (The Philosopher's Toolkit [2003], §2.03) | |
A reaction: I don't accept this division (linked here to Hegel). I am a fan of analysis, as practised by Aristotle, but it is like dismantling an engine to identify and clean the parts, before reassembling it more efficiently. |
2556 | Rational certainty may be victory in argument rather than knowledge of facts [Rorty] |
Full Idea: We can think of "rational certainty" as a matter of victory in argument rather than relation to an object known. | |
From: Richard Rorty (Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature [1980], 3.4) |