4 ideas
| 22297 | Dummett saw realism as acceptance of bivalence, rather than of mind-independent entities [Dummett, by Potter] |
| Full Idea: Dummett aimed to characterise realism in terms not of the mind-independence of the entities but of the validity of bivalence for sentences referring to them. | |
| From: report of Michael Dummett (Realism [1982]) by Michael Potter - The Rise of Analytic Philosophy 1879-1930 21 'Lang' | |
| A reaction: Hence he called himself a 'philosopher of language', rather than a 'philosopher of thought'. Philosophers of language are more likely to end up as anti-realists, I suspect. |
| 2614 | Modern phenomenalism holds that objects are logical constructions out of sense-data [Ayer] |
| Full Idea: Nowadays phenomenalism is held to be a theory of perception which says that physical objects are logical constructions out of sense-data. | |
| From: A.J. Ayer (Phenomenalism [1947], §1) |
| 2615 | The concept of sense-data allows us to discuss appearances without worrying about reality [Ayer] |
| Full Idea: The introduction of the term 'sense-datum' is a means of referring to appearances without prejudging the question of what it is, if anything, that they are appearances of. | |
| From: A.J. Ayer (Phenomenalism [1947], §1) |
| 23873 | Dividing history books into separate chapters is disastrous [Weil] |
| Full Idea: The division of history textbooks into chapters will cost us many disastrous mistakes. | |
| From: Simone Weil (Fragments [1936], p.131) | |
| A reaction: Nice observation. The point is that we fail to grasp what really happened if we draw sharp lines across history. |