display all the ideas for this combination of texts
9 ideas
| 22052 | Kant's nature is just a system of necessary laws [Bowie on Kant] |
| Full Idea: In the first Critique, nature is just a system of necessary laws. | |
| From: comment on Immanuel Kant (Critique of Pure Reason [1781]) by Andrew Bowie - German Philosophy: a very short introduction 1 | |
| A reaction: This seems to have provoked rebellion in Schiller and the early Romantics, and Kant tried to add teleology to his picture of nature. Leibniz saw nature as dimly alive, and Schiller focused on organisms. Biology is not very lawlike. |
| 8256 | Kant identifies nature with the scientific picture of it as the realm of law [Kant, by McDowell] |
| Full Idea: For Kant the idea of nature is the idea of the realm of law, the idea that came into focus with the rise of modern science. | |
| From: report of Immanuel Kant (Critique of Pure Reason [1781]) by John McDowell - Mind and World V.4 | |
| A reaction: Any doubts about the existence of laws of nature (e.g. Ideas 5470, 6781, 5474) would pull the mat out from under this view. I am inclined to view nature as the realm of natural kinds, which give rise to the regularities we call 'laws'. |
| 20812 | Covers are for shields, and sheaths for swords; likewise, all in the cosmos is for some other thing [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: Just as the cover was made for the sake of the shield, and the sheath for the sword, in the same way everything else except the cosmos was made for the sake of other things. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by M. Tullius Cicero - On the Nature of the Gods ('De natura deorum') 2.37 | |
| A reaction: Chrysippus was wise to stop at the cosmos. Similarly, religious teleology had better not ask about the purpose of God. What does he think pebbles are for? Nature is the source of stoic value, so it needs to be purposeful. |
| 5591 | Reason must assume as necessary that everything in a living organism has a proportionate purpose [Kant] |
| Full Idea: Regarding the nature of living beings in this world, reason must assume as a necessary principle that no organ, no faculty, nothing superfluous, or disproportionate to its use, hence nothing purposeless, is to be met with. | |
| From: Immanuel Kant (Critique of Pure Reason [1781], B425) | |
| A reaction: Extraordinary to treat this as an a priori truth! In fact Darwin seems to have discovered that most organs have a purpose, but sometimes they have become redundant, and certainly they can be disproportionate. Did Kant really need that massive intellect? |
| 21403 | The later Stoics identified the logos with an air-fire compound, called 'pneuma' [Chrysippus, by Long] |
| Full Idea: From Chrysippus onwards, the Stoics identified the logos throughout each world-cycle not with pure fire, but with a compound of fire and air, 'pneuma'. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by A.A. Long - Hellenistic Philosophy 4.4.2 | |
| A reaction: I suspect this was because breath is so vital to the human body. |
| 20828 | Fire is a separate element, not formed with others (as was previously believed) [Chrysippus, by Stobaeus] |
| Full Idea: In his theory fire is said independently to be an element, since it is not formed together with another one, whereas according to the earlier theory fire is formed with other elements. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by John Stobaeus - Anthology 1.10.16c | |
| A reaction: The point is that fire precedes the other elements, and is superior to them. |
| 5975 | Stoics say earth, air, fire and water are the primary elements [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: The Stoics call the four bodies - earth and water and air and fire - primary elements. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE], fr 444) by Plutarch - 72: Against Stoics on common Conceptions 1085c | |
| A reaction: Elsewhere (fr 413) Chrysippus denies that they are all 'primary'. Essentially, though, he seems to be adopting the doctrine of Empedocles and Aristotle, in specific opposition to Epicurus' atomism. |
| 12705 | Epicurean atoms are distinguished by their extreme hardness [Garber] |
| Full Idea: In Epicurean atomism (of Cordemoy, for example) there is a world of basic things distinguished by virtue of their extreme hardness. | |
| From: Daniel Garber (Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad [2009], 2) | |
| A reaction: Garber says that Leibniz espouses 'substantial atomism', which is different from this. Leibniz's atoms have active power, where these atoms just embody total resistance. |
| 5615 | Extension and impenetrability together make the concept of matter [Kant] |
| Full Idea: Extension and impenetrability together constitute the concept of matter. | |
| From: Immanuel Kant (Critique of Pure Reason [1781], B646/A618) | |
| A reaction: Descartes had settled for extension alone. Kant's simple claim is probably now just a historical footnote, as we would now turn to physicists to define matter. Extension might survive, but impenetrability is not a key notion in quantum mechanics. |