Combining Texts

Ideas for 'On What Grounds What', 'Against Liberalism' and 'Events'

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5 ideas

7. Existence / B. Change in Existence / 4. Events / c. Reduction of events
9413 An event is a change in or to an object [Lombard, by Mumford]
     Full Idea: Lombard holds that an event is a change in or to an object.
     From: report of Lawrence B. Lombard (Events [1986]) by Stephen Mumford - Laws in Nature 2.1
     A reaction: This strikes me as more plausible than Davidson's view that events are primitive, or Kim's that they are exemplifications of properties. Events then exist just insofar as we wish to (or are able to) discriminate them.
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 1. Grounding / a. Nature of grounding
13748 Grounding is unanalysable and primitive, and is the basic structuring concept in metaphysics [Schaffer,J]
     Full Idea: Grounding should be taken as primitive, as per the neo-Aristotelian approach. Grounding is an unanalyzable but needed notion - it is the primitive structuring conception of metaphysics.
     From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.2)
     A reaction: [he cites K.Fine 1991] I find that this simple claim clarifies the discussions of Kit Fine, where you are not always quite sure what the game is. I agree fully with it. It makes metaphysics interesting, where cataloguing entities is boring.
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 5. Supervenience / a. Nature of supervenience
13747 Supervenience is just modal correlation [Schaffer,J]
     Full Idea: Supervenience is mere modal correlation.
     From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.2)
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 7. Abstract/Concrete / a. Abstract/concrete
13744 The cosmos is the only fundamental entity, from which all else exists by abstraction [Schaffer,J]
     Full Idea: My preferred view is that there is only one fundamental entity - the whole concrete cosmos - from which all else exists by abstraction.
     From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1)
     A reaction: This looks to me like weak anti-realism - that there are no natural 'joints' in nature - but I don't think Schaffer intends that. I take the joints to be fundamentals, which necessitates that the cosmos has parts. His 'abstraction' is clearly a process.
7. Existence / E. Categories / 4. Category Realism
13739 Maybe categories are just the different ways that things depend on basic substances [Schaffer,J]
     Full Idea: Maybe the categories are determined by the different grounding relations, ..so that categories just are the ways things depend on substances. ...Categories are places in the dependence ordering.
     From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 1.3)