39 ideas
| 3358 | Metaphysics focuses on Platonism, essentialism, materialism and anti-realism [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: In contemporary metaphysics the major areas of discussion are Platonism, essentialism, materialism and anti-realism. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], After) |
| 3312 | There are the 'is' of predication (a function), the 'is' of identity (equals), and the 'is' of existence (quantifier) [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: At least since Russell, one has routinely distinguished between the 'is' of predication ('Socrates is wise', Fx), the 'is' of identity ('Morning Star is Evening Star', =), and the 'is' of existence ('the cat is under the bed', Ex). | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch. 7) | |
| A reaction: This seems horribly nitpicking to many people, but I love it - because it is just true, and it is a truth right at the basis of the confusions in our talk. Analytic philosophy forever! [P.S. 'Tiddles is a cat' - the 'is' membership] |
| 3352 | Analytical philosophy analyses separate concepts successfully, but lacks a synoptic vision of the results [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Analytical philosophy excels in the piecemeal analysis of causation, perception, knowledge and so on, but there is a striking poverty of any synoptic vision of these independent studies. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.22) |
| 3329 | Presumably the statements of science are true, but should they be taken literally or not? [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: As our bible, the Book of Science is presumed to contain only true sentences, but it is less clear how they are to be construed, which literally and which non-literally. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.13) |
| 22358 | Scientific objectivity lies in inter-subjective testing [Popper] |
| Full Idea: The objectivity of scientific statements lies in the fact that they can be inter-subjectively tested. | |
| From: Karl Popper (The Logic of Scientific Discovery [1934], p.22), quoted by Reiss,J/Spreger,J - Scientific Objectivity 2.4 | |
| A reaction: Does this mean that objectivity is the same as consensus? A bunch of subjective prejudiced fools can reach a consensus. And in the middle of that bunch there can be one person who is objecfive. Sounds wrong. |
| 3326 | Set theory attempts to reduce the 'is' of predication to mathematics [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Set theory offers the promise of a complete mathematization of the 'is' of predication. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.13) |
| 3327 | The set of Greeks is included in the set of men, but isn't a member of it [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Set inclusion is sharply distinguished from set membership (as the set of Greeks is found to be included in, but not a member of, the set of men). | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.13) |
| 3335 | The standard Z-F Intuition version of set theory has about ten agreed axioms [Benardete,JA, by PG] |
| Full Idea: Zermelo proposed seven axioms for set theory, with Fraenkel adding others, to produce the standard Z-F Intuition. | |
| From: report of José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.17) by PG - Db (ideas) |
| 3332 | Greeks saw the science of proportion as the link between geometry and arithmetic [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: The Greeks saw the independent science of proportion as the link between geometry and arithmetic. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.15) |
| 3330 | Negatives, rationals, irrationals and imaginaries are all postulated to solve baffling equations [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: The Negative numbers are postulated (magic word) to solve x=5-8, Rationals postulated to solve 2x=3, Irrationals for x-squared=2, and Imaginaries for x-squared=-1. (…and Zero for x=5-5) …and x/0 remains eternally open. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.14) |
| 3337 | Natural numbers are seen in terms of either their ordinality (Peano), or cardinality (set theory) [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: One approaches the natural numbers in terms of either their ordinality (Peano), or cardinality (set theory). | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.17) |
| 3310 | If slowness is a property of walking rather than the walker, we must allow that events exist [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Once we conceded that Tom can walk slowly or quickly, and that the slowness and quickness is a property of the walking and not of Tom, we can hardly refrain from quantifying over events (such as 'a walking') in our ontology. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch. 6) |
| 12793 | Early pre-Socratics had a mass-noun ontology, which was replaced by count-nouns [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: With their 'mass-noun' ontologies, the early pre-Socratics were blind to plurality ...but the count-noun ontologists came to dominate the field forever after. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch. 6) | |
| A reaction: The mass-nouns are such things as earth, air, fire and water. This is a very interesting historical observation (cited by Laycock). Our obsession with identity seems tied to formal logic. There is a whole other worldview waiting out there. |
| 3353 | If there is no causal interaction with transcendent Platonic objects, how can you learn about them? [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: How can you learn of the existence of transcendent Platonic objects if there is no causal interaction with them? | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.22) |
| 3304 | Why should packed-together particles be a thing (Mt Everest), but not scattered ones? [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Why suppose these particles packed together constitute a macro-entity (namely, Mt Everest), whereas those, of equal number, scattered around, fail to add up to anything beyond themselves? | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch. 2) |
| 3350 | Could a horse lose the essential property of being a horse, and yet continue to exist? [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Is being a horse an essential property of a horse? Can we so much as conceive the abstract possibility of a horse's ceasing to be a horse even while continuing to exist? | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.20) |
| 3309 | If a soldier continues to exist after serving as a soldier, does the wind cease to exist after it ceases to blow? [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: If a soldier need not cease to exist merely because he ceases to be a soldier, there is room to doubt that the wind ceases to exist when it ceases to be a wind. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch. 6) |
| 3351 | One can step into the same river twice, but not into the same water [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: One can step into the same river twice, but one must not expect to step into the same water. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.21) |
| 3314 | Absolutists might accept that to exist is relative, but relative to what? How about relative to itself? [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: With the thesis that to be as such is to be relative, the absolutist may be found to concur, but the issue turns on what it might be that a thing is supposed to be relative to. Why not itself? | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch. 8) |
| 3323 | Maybe self-identity isn't existence, if Pegasus can be self-identical but non-existent [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: 'Existence' can't be glossed as self-identical (critics say) because Pegasus, even while being self-identical, fails to exist. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.11) |
| 22049 | Transcendental idealism aims to explain objectivity through subjectivity [Bowie] |
| Full Idea: The aim of transcendental idealism is to give a basis for objectivity in terms of subjectivity. | |
| From: Andrew Bowie (German Philosophy: a very short introduction [2010], 1) | |
| A reaction: Hume used subjectivity to undermine the findings of objectivity. There was then no return to naive objectivity. Kant's aim then was to thwart global scepticism. Post-Kantians feared that he had failed. |
| 22055 | The Idealists saw the same unexplained spontaneity in Kant's judgements and choices [Bowie] |
| Full Idea: The Idealist saw in Kant that knowledge, which depends on the spontaneity of judgement, and self-determined spontaneous action, can be seen as sharing the same source, which is not accessible to scientific investigation. | |
| From: Andrew Bowie (German Philosophy: a very short introduction [2010]) | |
| A reaction: This is the 'spontaneity' of judgements and choices which was seen as the main idea in Kant. It inspired romantic individualism. The judgements are the rule-based application of concepts. |
| 22054 | German Idealism tried to stop oppositions of appearances/things and receptivity/spontaneity [Bowie] |
| Full Idea: A central aim of German Idealism is to overcome Kant's oppositions between appearances and thing in themselves, and between receptivity and spontaneity. | |
| From: Andrew Bowie (German Philosophy: a very short introduction [2010], 2) | |
| A reaction: I have the impression that there were two strategies: break down the opposition within the self (Fichte), or break down the opposition in the world (Spinozism). |
| 22056 | Crucial to Idealism is the idea of continuity between receptivity and spontaneous judgement [Bowie] |
| Full Idea: A crucial idea for German Idealism (from Hamann) is that apparently passive receptivity and active spontaneity are in fact different degrees of the same 'activity, and the gap between subject and world can be closed. | |
| From: Andrew Bowie (German Philosophy: a very short introduction [2010], 3) | |
| A reaction: The 'passive' bit seems to be Hume's 'impressions', which are Kant's 'intuitions', which need 'spontaneous' interpretation to become experiences. Critics of Kant said this implied a dualism. |
| 3306 | The clearest a priori knowledge is proving non-existence through contradiction [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: One proves non-existence (e.g. of round squares) by using logic to derive a contradiction from the concept; it is precisely here, in such proofs, that we find the clearest example of a priori knowledge. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch. 4) |
| 3349 | If we know truths about prime numbers, we seem to have synthetic a priori knowledge of Platonic objects [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Assume that we know to be true propositions of the form 'There are exactly x prime numbers between y and z', and synthetic a priori truths about Platonic objects are delivered to us on a silver platter. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.18) |
| 3341 | Logical positivism amounts to no more than 'there is no synthetic a priori' [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Logical positivism has been concisely summarised as 'there is no synthetic a priori'. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.18) |
| 3344 | Assertions about existence beyond experience can only be a priori synthetic [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: No one thinks that the proposition that something exists that transcends all possible experience harbours a logical inconsistency. Its denial cannot therefore be an analytic proposition, so it must be synthetic, though only knowable on a priori grounds. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.18) |
| 3345 | Appeals to intuition seem to imply synthetic a priori knowledge [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Appeals to intuition - no matter how informal - can hardly fail to smack of the synthetic a priori. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.18) |
| 22188 | Give Nobel Prizes for really good refutations? [Gorham on Popper] |
| Full Idea: Popper implies that we should be giving Nobel Prizes to scientists who use severe tests to show us what the world is not like! | |
| From: comment on Karl Popper (The Logic of Scientific Discovery [1934]) by Geoffrey Gorham - Philosophy of Science 2 | |
| A reaction: A lovely simple point. The refuters are important members of the scientific team, but not the leaders. |
| 7780 | Falsification is the criterion of demarcation between science and non-science [Popper, by Magee] |
| Full Idea: According to Popper, falsification is the criterion of demarcation between science and non-science. | |
| From: report of Karl Popper (The Logic of Scientific Discovery [1934]) by Bryan Magee - Popper Ch.3 | |
| A reaction: If I propose something which might be falsified in a hundred years, is it science NOW? Suppose my theory appeared to be falsifiable, but (after much effort) it turned out not to be? Suppose I just see a pattern (like quark theory) in a set of facts? |
| 16830 | We don't only reject hypotheses because we have falsified them [Lipton on Popper] |
| Full Idea: Popper's mistake is to hold that disconfirmation and elimination work exclusively through refutation. | |
| From: comment on Karl Popper (The Logic of Scientific Discovery [1934]) by Peter Lipton - Inference to the Best Explanation (2nd) 05 'Explanation' | |
| A reaction: The point is that we reject hypotheses even if they have not actually been refuted, on the grounds that they don't give a good explanation. I agree entirely with Lipton. |
| 6794 | If falsification requires logical inconsistency, then probabilistic statements can't be falsified [Bird on Popper] |
| Full Idea: In Popper's sense of the word 'falsify', whereby an observation statement falsifies a hypothesis only by being logically inconsistent with it, nothing can ever falsify a probabilistic or statistical hypothesis, which is therefore unscientific. | |
| From: comment on Karl Popper (The Logic of Scientific Discovery [1934]) by Alexander Bird - Philosophy of Science Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: In general, no prediction can be falsified until the events occur. This seems to be Aristotle's 'sea fight' problem (Idea 1703). |
| 6795 | When Popper gets in difficulties, he quietly uses induction to help out [Bird on Popper] |
| Full Idea: It is a feature of Popper's philosophy that when the going gets tough, induction is quietly called upon to help out. | |
| From: comment on Karl Popper (The Logic of Scientific Discovery [1934]) by Alexander Bird - Philosophy of Science Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: This appears to be the central reason for the decline in Popper's reputation as the saviour of science. It would certainly seem absurd to say that you know nothing when you have lots of verification but not a glimmer of falsification. |
| 3856 | Good theories have empirical content, explain a lot, and are not falsified [Popper, by Newton-Smith] |
| Full Idea: Popper's principles are roughly that one theory is superior to another if it has greater empirical content, if it can account for the successes of the first theory, and if it has not been falsified (unlike the first theory). | |
| From: report of Karl Popper (The Logic of Scientific Discovery [1934]) by W.H. Newton-Smith - The Rationality of Science I.6 |
| 7779 | There is no such thing as induction [Popper, by Magee] |
| Full Idea: According to Popper, induction is a dispensable concept, a myth. It does not exist. There is no such thing. | |
| From: report of Karl Popper (The Logic of Scientific Discovery [1934]) by Bryan Magee - Popper Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: This is a nice bold summary of the Popper view - that falsification is the underlying rational activity which we mistakenly think is verification by repeated observations. Put like this, Popper seems to be wrong. We obviously learn from experiences. |
| 3860 | Science cannot be shown to be rational if induction is rejected [Newton-Smith on Popper] |
| Full Idea: If Popper follows Hume in abandoning induction, there is no way in which he can justify the claims that there is growth of scientific knowledge and that science is a rational activity. | |
| From: comment on Karl Popper (The Logic of Scientific Discovery [1934]) by W.H. Newton-Smith - The Rationality of Science III.3 |
| 3334 | Rationalists see points as fundamental, but empiricists prefer regions [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Rationalists have been happier with an ontology of points, and empiricists with an ontology of regions. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch.16) |
| 3308 | In the ontological argument a full understanding of the concept of God implies a contradiction in 'There is no God' [Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: In the ontological argument a deep enough understanding of the very concept of God allows one to derive by logic a contradiction from the statement 'There is no God'. | |
| From: José A. Benardete (Metaphysics: the logical approach [1989], Ch. 4) |