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Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Cratylus' and 'Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind'

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4 ideas

9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / d. Individuation by haecceity
13787 Doesn't each thing have an essence, just as it has other qualities? [Plato]
     Full Idea: Don't you think that just as each thing has a colour or some of those other qualities we mentioned, it also has a being or essence?
     From: Plato (Cratylus [c.377 BCE], 423e)
     A reaction: The Greek here seems to be 'ousia', which I increasingly think should be translated as 'distinct identity', rather than as 'existence' or as 'essence'. Maybe the philosophical term 'haecceity' captures it best.
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 3. Individual Essences
13774 Things don't have every attribute, and essence isn't private, so each thing has an essence [Plato]
     Full Idea: If Euthydemus is wrong that everything always has every attribute simultaneously, or that being or essence is private for each person, then it is clear that things have some fixed being or essence of their own.
     From: Plato (Cratylus [c.377 BCE], 386d)
     A reaction: I'm not sure what 'being or essence' translates. If it translates 'ousia' then I wouldn't make too much of this remark from an essentialist point of view.
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 15. Against Essentialism
13772 Is the being or essence of each thing private to each person? [Plato]
     Full Idea: Is the being or essence of each of the things that are something private to each person, as Protagoras tells us?
     From: Plato (Cratylus [c.377 BCE], 385e)
     A reaction: This kind of drastic personal relativism about essences doesn't sound very plausible, but the idea that essences are private to each culture, or to each language, must certainly be taken seriously.
9. Objects / F. Identity among Objects / 7. Indiscernible Objects
13788 If we made a perfect duplicate of Cratylus, there would be two Cratyluses [Plato]
     Full Idea: Soc: Suppose we made a duplicate of everything you have and put it beside you; would there then be two Cratyluses, or Cratylus and an image of Cratylus? Crat: It seems to me, Socrates, that there would be two Cratyluses.
     From: Plato (Cratylus [c.377 BCE], 432c)
     A reaction: Don't think that science fiction examples are a modern development in philosophy. Plato has just invented the Startrek transporter. The two Cratyluses are the two spheres in Max Black's famous example.