Combining Texts

Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Function and Concept' and 'Person and Object'

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5 ideas

7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 6. Criterion for Existence

18899	Frege takes the existence of horses to be part of their concept [Frege, by Sommers]
	Full Idea: Frege regarded the existence of horses as a property of the concept 'horse'.
	From: report of Gottlob Frege (Function and Concept [1891]) by Fred Sommers - Intellectual Autobiography 'Realism'

7. Existence / B. Change in Existence / 4. Events / a. Nature of events

15832	Events are states of affairs that occur at certain places and times [Chisholm]
	Full Idea: We will restrict events to those states of affairs which occur at certain places and times.
	From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 4.6)
	A reaction: If I say 'the bomb may explode sometime', that doesn't seem to refer to an event. Philosophers like Chisholm bowl along, defining left, right and centre, and never seem to step back from their system and ask obvious critical questions.

7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 9. States of Affairs

15828	I propose that events and propositions are two types of states of affairs [Chisholm]
	Full Idea: I will propose that events are said to constitute one type of states of affairs, and propositions another
	From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 4.1)
	A reaction: I would much prefer to distinguish between the static and the dynamic, so we have a static or timeless state of affairs, and a dynamic event or process. Propositions I take to be neither. He really means 'facts', which subsume the whole lot.

15829	The mark of a state of affairs is that it is capable of being accepted [Chisholm]
	Full Idea: We will say that the mark of a state of affairs is the fact that it is capable of being accepted.
	From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 4.2)
	A reaction: I find this a quite bewildering proposal. It means that it is impossible for there to be a state of affairs which is beyond human conception, but why commit to that?

15809	A state of affairs pertains to a thing if it implies that it has some property [Chisholm]
	Full Idea: A state of affairs pertains to a thing if it implies the thing to have a certain property.
	From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.4)
	A reaction: For this to work, we must include extrinsic and relational properties, and properties which are derived from mere predication. I think this is bad metaphysics, and leads to endless confusions.