21673
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There are simple and complex facts; the latter depend on further facts [Chrysippus, by Cicero]
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Full Idea:
Chrysippus says there are two classes of facts, simple and complex. An instance of a simple fact is 'Socrates will die at a given date', ...but 'Milo will wrestle at Olympia' is a complex statement, because there can be no wrestling without an opponent.
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From:
report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by M. Tullius Cicero - On Fate ('De fato') 13.30
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A reaction:
We might say that there are atomic and complex facts, but our atomic facts tend to be much simpler, usually just saying some object has some property.
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16219
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Non-linguistic things cannot be indeterminate, because they don't have truth-values at all [Hawley]
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Full Idea:
Non-linguistic objects, properties, and states of affairs cannot be indeterminate because they cannot have determinate truth-values either. No cloud is indeterminate, just as no cloud is either determinately true or determinately false.
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From:
Katherine Hawley (How Things Persist [2001], 4.1)
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A reaction:
If vagueness must be linguistic, this means animals can never experience it, which I doubt. Presumably 'this is a cloud' is only made vague by the vagueness of the object, rather than by the vagueness of the sentence?
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16208
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Supervaluation refers to one vaguely specified thing, through satisfaction by everything in some range [Hawley]
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Full Idea:
Supervaluationists take a present-tense predication as concerning a single, but vaguely specified, moment. …It is indeterminate which of a range of moments enters into the truth conditions, but it is true if satisfied by every member of the range.
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From:
Katherine Hawley (How Things Persist [2001], 2.7)
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A reaction:
She is discussing stage theory, but this is a helpful clarification of the idea of supervaluation. Something can be satisfied by a whole bunch of values, even though you are not sure which one.
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