display all the ideas for this combination of texts
5 ideas
| 15067 | A-theorists tend to reject the tensed/tenseless distinction [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: Most A-theorists have been inclined to reject the tensed/tenseless distinction. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Necessity and Non-Existence [2005], 01) | |
| A reaction: Presumably this is because they reject the notion of 'tenseless' truths. But sentences like 'two and two make four' seem not to be very tensy. |
| 15077 | It is said that in the A-theory, all existents and objects must be tensed, as well as the sentences [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: It is said that there is no room in the A-theorists' ontology for a realm of timeless existents. Just as there is a tendency to think that every sentence is tensed, so there is a tendency to think that every object must enjoy a tensed form of existence. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Necessity and Non-Existence [2005], 10) | |
| A reaction: Fine is arguing for certain things to exist or be true independently of time (such as arithmetic, or essential identities). I struggle with the notion of timeless existence. |
| 15066 | B-theorists say tensed sentences have an unfilled argument-place for a time [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: B-theorists regard tensed sentences as incomplete expressions, implicitly containing an unfilled argument-place for the time at which they are to be evaluated. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Necessity and Non-Existence [2005], 01) | |
| A reaction: To distinguish past from future it looks as if you would need two argument-places, not one. Then there are 'used to be' and 'had been' to evaluate. |
| 23302 | Plants have far less life than animals, but more life than other corporeal entities [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: The genus of plants, whilst it is devoid of life compared with an animal, is endowed with life as compared with other corporeal entities. In the sea there are certain objects which one would be at a loss to determine whether they be animal or vegetable. | |
| From: Aristotle (The History of Animals [c.344 BCE], 588b09) | |
| A reaction: It seems that Aristotle takes life to come in degrees, assessed by the amount of physical vitality observed. This seems to make lambs more alive than sheep, which isn't very plausible. This is part of his 'gradualist' view of nature. |
| 23301 | There is a gradual proceeding from the inanimate to animals, with no clear borderlines [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Nature proceeds little by little from things lifeless to animal life so that it is impossible to determine the exact line of demarcation, nor on which side an intermediate form should lie. ...In plants there is a continuous ascent towards the animal. | |
| From: Aristotle (The History of Animals [c.344 BCE], 588b04) | |
| A reaction: This in itself should have alerted medieval Christians to the problematic nature of the idea that animal species were divinely created. |