display all the ideas for this combination of texts
4 ideas
| 461 | God is a pure, solitary, and eternal sphere [Empedocles] |
| Full Idea: God is equal in all directions to himself and altogether eternal, a rounded Sphere enjoying a circular solitude. | |
| From: Empedocles (fragments/reports [c.453 BCE], B028), quoted by John Stobaeus - Anthology 1.15.2 |
| 466 | God is pure mind permeating the universe [Empedocles] |
| Full Idea: God is mind, holy and ineffable, and only mind, which darts through the whole cosmos with its swift thought. | |
| From: Empedocles (fragments/reports [c.453 BCE], B134), quoted by Ammonius - On 'De Interpretatione' 4.5.249.6 |
| 1719 | In Empedocles' theory God is ignorant because, unlike humans, he doesn't know one of the elements (strife) [Aristotle on Empedocles] |
| Full Idea: It is a consequence of Empedocles' view that God is the most unintelligent thing, for he alone is ignorant of one of the elements, namely strife, whereas mortal creatures are familiar with them all. | |
| From: comment on Empedocles (fragments/reports [c.453 BCE]) by Aristotle - De Anima 410b08 |
| 10332 | Omniscience is incoherent, since knowledge is a social concept [Kusch] |
| Full Idea: The very idea of omniscience is dubious, at least for the communitarian epistemologist, since knowing is a social state, and knowledge is a social status, needing a position in a social network. | |
| From: Martin Kusch (Knowledge by Agreement [2002], Ch. 4) | |
| A reaction: A nice test case. Would an omniscient mind have evidence for its beliefs? Would it continually check for coherence? Is it open to criticism? Does it even entertain the possibility of error? Could another 'omniscient' mind challenge it? |