43 ideas
| 15801 | Many philosophers aim to understand metaphysics by studying ourselves [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz, Reid, Brentano and others have held that, by considering certain obvious facts about ourselves, we can arrive at an understanding of the general principles of metaphysics. The present book is intended to confirm that view. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], Intro 1) | |
| A reaction: I sympathise, but don't really agree. I see metaphysics as a process of filtering ourselves out of the picture, leaving an account of how things actually are. |
| 15802 | I use variables to show that each item remains the same entity throughout [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: My use of variables is not merely pedantic; it indicates that the various items on our list pertain to one and the same entity throughout. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], Intro 2) | |
| A reaction: I am one of those poor souls who finds modern analytic philosophy challenging simply because I think in terms of old fashioned words, instead of thinking like mathematicians and logicians. This is a nice defence of their approach. |
| 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. |
| 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. |
| 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. |
| 15827 | Some properties, such as 'being a widow', can be seen as 'rooted outside the time they are had' [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Some properties may be said to be 'rooted outside the times at which they are had'. Examples are the property of being a widow and the property of being a future President. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 3.4) | |
| A reaction: This is the sort of mess you when you treat the category in which an object belongs as if it was one of its properties. We categorise because of properties. |
| 15830 | Some properties can never be had, like being a round square [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: There are properties which nothing can possibly have; an example is the property of being both round and square. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 4.2) | |
| A reaction: This is a rather bizarre Meinongian claim. For a start it sounds like two properties not one. Is there a property of being both 'over here' and 'over there'? We might say the round-square property must exist, for God to fail to implement it (?) |
| 15804 | If some dogs are brown, that entails the properties of 'being brown' and 'being canine' [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: The state of affairs which is some dogs being brown may be said to entail (make it necessarily so) the property of 'being brown', as well as the properties of 'being canine' and 'being both brown and canine'. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.4) | |
| A reaction: And the property of 'being such that it is both brown and canine and brown or canine'. Etc. This is dangerous nonsense. Making all truths entail the existence of some property means we can no longer get to grips with real properties. |
| 15810 | Maybe we can only individuate things by relating them to ourselves [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: It may well be that the only way we have, ultimately, of individuating anything is to relate it uniquely to ourselves. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.5) | |
| A reaction: I'm guessing that Chisholm is thinking of 'ourselves' as meaning just himself, but I'm thinking this is plausible if he means the human community. I doubt whether there is much a philosopher can say on individuation that is revealing or precise. |
| 15805 | Being the tallest man is an 'individual concept', but not a haecceity [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Being the tallest man and being President of the United States are 'individual concepts', but not haecceities. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.4) | |
| A reaction: Chisholm introduces this term, to help him explain his haecceity more clearly. (His proposal on that adds a lot of fog to this area of metaphysics). |
| 15807 | A haecceity is a property had necessarily, and strictly confined to one entity [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: An individual essence or haecceity is a narrower type of individual concept. This is a property which is had necessarily, and which it is impossible for any other thing to have. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.4) | |
| A reaction: [Apologies to Chisholm for leaving out the variables from his definition of haecceity. See Idea 15802] See also Idea 15805. The tallest man is unique, but someone else could become the tallest man. No one else could acquire 'being Socrates'. |
| 15814 | A peach is sweet and fuzzy, but it doesn't 'have' those qualities [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Our idea of a peach is not an idea of something that 'has' those particular qualities, but the concrete thing that 'is' sweet and round and fuzzy. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.6) | |
| A reaction: This is the beginnings of his 'adverbial' account of properties, with which you have to sympathise. It tries to eliminate the possibility of some propertyless thing, to which properties can then be added, like sprinkling sugar on it. |
| 12852 | If x is ever part of y, then y is necessarily such that x is part of y at any time that y exists [Chisholm, by Simons] |
| Full Idea: Chisholm has an axiom: if x is a proper part of y, then necessarily if y exists then x is part of it. If x is ever part of y, they y is necessarily such that x is part of y at any time that y exists. | |
| From: report of Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], p.149) by Peter Simons - Parts 5.3 | |
| A reaction: This is Chisholm's notorious mereological essentialism, that all parts are necessary, and change of part means change of thing. However, it looks to me more like a proposal about what properties are necessary, not what are essential. |
| 15808 | A traditional individual essence includes all of a thing's necessary characteristics [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: According to the traditional account of individual essence, each thing has only one individual essence and it includes all the characteristics that the thing has necessarily. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.4) | |
| A reaction: Chisholm is steeped in medieval theology, but I don't think this is quite what Aristotle meant. Everyone nowadays has to exclude the 'trivial' necessary properties, for a start. But why? I'm contemplating things which survive the loss of their essence. |
| 12851 | Intermittence is seen in a toy fort, which is dismantled then rebuilt with the same bricks [Chisholm, by Simons] |
| Full Idea: Chisholm poses the problem of intermittence with the case of a toy fort which is built from toy bricks, taken apart, and then reassembled with the same bricks in the same position. | |
| From: report of Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], p.90) by Peter Simons - Parts 5.3 | |
| A reaction: You could strengthen the case, or the problem, by using those very bricks to build a ship during the interval. Or building a fort with a different design. Most people would be happy to say that same object (token) has been rebuilt. |
| 15806 | The property of being identical with me is an individual concept [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: I wish to urge that the property of being identical with me is an individual concept. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.4) | |
| A reaction: I can just about live with the claim (for formal purposes) that I am identical with myself, but I strongly resist my then having a 'property' consisting of 'being identical with myself' (or 'not being identical with somone else' etc.). |
| 15826 | There is 'loose' identity between things if their properties, or truths about them, might differ [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: I suggest that there is a 'loose' sense of identity that is consistent with saying 'A has a property that B does not have', or 'some things are true of A but not of B'. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 3.2) | |
| A reaction: He is trying to explicate Bishop Butler's famous distinction between 'strict and philosophical' and 'loose and popular' senses. We might want to claim that the genuine identity relation is the 'loose' one (pace the logicians and mathematicians). |
| 15819 | Do sense-data have structure, location, weight, and constituting matter? [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Does a red sense-datum or appearance have a back side as well as a front? Where is it located? Does it have any weight? What is it made of? | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.8) | |
| A reaction: A reductive physicalist like myself is not so troubled by questions like this, which smack of Descartes's non-spatial argument for dualism. |
| 15816 | 'I feel depressed' is more like 'he runs slowly' than like 'he has a red book' [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: The sentences 'I feel depressed' and 'I feel exuberant' are related in the way in which 'He runs slowly' and 'He runs swiftly' are related, and not in the way in which 'He has a red book' and 'He has a brown book' are related. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.8) | |
| A reaction: Ducasse 1942 and Chisholm 1957 seem to be the sources of the adverbial theory. I gather Chisholm gave it up late in his career. The adverbial theory seems sort of right, but it doesn't illuminate what is happening. |
| 15818 | So called 'sense-data' are best seen as 'modifications' of the person experiencing them [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: We may summarise my way of looking at appearing by saying that so-called appearances or sense-data are 'affections' or 'modifications' of the person who is said to experience them. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.8) | |
| A reaction: Hm. That seems to transfer the ontological problem of the redness of the tomato from the tomato to the perceiver, but leave the basic difficulty untouched. I think we need to pull apart the intrinsic and subjective ingredients here. |
| 15817 | If we can say a man senses 'redly', why not also 'rectangularly'? [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: If we say a man 'senses redly', may we also say that he 'senses rhomboidally' or 'senses rectangularly'? There is no reason why not. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.8) | |
| A reaction: This is Chisholm replying to one of the best known objections to the adverbial theory. Can we sense 'wobblyrhomboidallywithpinkdots-ly'? Can we perceive 'landscapely'? The problem is bigger than he thinks. |
| 15831 | Explanations have states of affairs as their objects [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: I suggest that states of affairs constitute the objects of the theory of explanation. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 4.4) | |
| A reaction: It is good to ask what the constituents of a theory of explanation might be. He has an all-embracing notion of state of affairs, whereas I would say that events and processes are separate. See Idea 15828. |
| 15811 | I am picked out uniquely by my individual essence, which is 'being identical with myself' [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: What picks me out uniquely, without relating me to some other being? It can only be the property of 'being me' or 'being identical with myself', which can only be an individual essence or haecceity, a property I cannot fail to have. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.5) | |
| A reaction: Only a philosopher (and a modern analytic one at that) would imagine that this was some crucial insight into how we know our own identities. |
| 15815 | Sartre says the ego is 'opaque'; I prefer to say that it is 'transparent' [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Sartre says the ego is 'opaque'; I would think it better to say that the ego is 'transparent'. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.8) | |
| A reaction: Insofar as we evidently have a self, I would say it is neither. It is directly experienced, through willing, motivation, and mental focus. |
| 15813 | People use 'I' to refer to themselves, with the meaning of their own individual essence [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Each person uses the first person pronoun to refer to himself, and in such a way that its reference (Bedeutung) is to himself and its intention (Sinn) is his own individual essence. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 1.5) | |
| A reaction: I think this is exactly right, and may be the basis of the way we essentialise in our understanding of the rest of reality. I have a strong notion of what is essential in me and what is not. |
| 15803 | Bad theories of the self see it as abstract, or as a bundle, or as a process [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Some very strange theories of the self suggest it is an abstract object, such as a class, or a property, or a function. Some theories imply that I am a collection, or a bundle, or a structure, or an event, or a process (or even a verb!). | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], Intro 4) | |
| A reaction: I certainly reject the abstract lot, but the second lot doesn't sound so silly to me, especially 'structure' and 'process'. I don't buy the idea that the Self is an indivisible monad. It is a central aspect of brain process - the prioritiser of thought. |
| 15821 | Determinism claims that every event has a sufficient causal pre-condition [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Determinism is the proposition that, for every event that occurs, there occurs a sufficient causal condition of that event. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 2.2) | |
| A reaction: You need an ontology of events to put it precisely this way. Doesn't it also work the other way: that there is an event for every sufficient causal condition? The beginning and the end of reality pose problems. |
| 15824 | There are mere omissions (through ignorance, perhaps), and people can 'commit an omission' [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: If a man does not respond to a greeting, if he was unaware that he was addressed then his failure to respond may be a mere omission. But if he intended to snub the man, then he could be said to have 'committed the omission'. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 2.6) | |
| A reaction: Chisholm has an extensive knowledge of Catholic theology. These neat divisions are subject to vagueness and a continuum of cases in real life. |
| 8239 | If the King likes music then there is hope for the state [Mengzi (Mencius)] |
| Full Idea: If the King has a great fondness for music, then perhaps there is hope for the state of Ch'i. | |
| From: Mengzi (Mencius) (The Mengzi (Mencius) [c.332 BCE], 1.B.1) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be Shakespeare's attitude to music as well. The general idea must be that love of music requires a selfless state of mind, where the mind revels in the beauty of something outside of itself. Respect is the desirable result. |
| 23398 | Human nature is naturally compassionate and good (as a 'sprout'), but people may not be good [Mengzi (Mencius), by Norden] |
| Full Idea: Mengzi does not claim that humans are innately good; he claims that human nature is innately good. …He says that 'the heart of compassion' (manifested when anyone sees a child about to fall into a well) is the 'sprout of benevolence'. | |
| From: report of Mengzi (Mencius) (The Mengzi (Mencius) [c.332 BCE]) by Bryan van Norden - Intro to Classical Chinese Philosophy 6.II | |
| A reaction: There is a nice distinction here between the 'sprout' of human nature and the finished product. Seeds have the potential to produce tall healthy plants, but circumstances can warp them. |
| 23400 | Righteousness is extending the unthinkable, to reveal what must be done [Mengzi (Mencius)] |
| Full Idea: People all have things they will not do. To extend this reaction to that which they will do is righteousness. | |
| From: Mengzi (Mencius) (The Mengzi (Mencius) [c.332 BCE], 7B31), quoted by Bryan van Norden - Intro to Classical Chinese Philosophy 6.IV | |
| A reaction: Very nice! Kekes points out the enormous importance of unthinkable deeds. Depravity is when the unthinkable gradually begins to look possible, which is probably a social phenomenon, a creeping cancer in a culture. |
| 23399 | Each correct feeling relies on an underlying virtue [Mengzi (Mencius)] |
| Full Idea: The heart of compassion is benevolence. The heart of disdain is righteousness. The heart of respect is propriety. The heart of approval and disapproval is wisdom. | |
| From: Mengzi (Mencius) (The Mengzi (Mencius) [c.332 BCE], 6A6), quoted by Bryan van Norden - Intro to Classical Chinese Philosophy 6.III | |
| A reaction: 'Disdain' seems to be the response to anyone who is disrespectful. Note that wisdom concerns judgements. Respect seems to be more of a social convention than an actual concern for others. |
| 8235 | Should a coward who ran fifty paces from a battle laugh at another who ran a hundred? [Mengzi (Mencius)] |
| Full Idea: If two soldiers were fleeing from a battle, and one stopped after a hundred paces and the other stopped after a fifty paces, what would you think if the latter, as one who only ran fifty paces, were to laugh at the former who ran a hundred? | |
| From: Mengzi (Mencius) (The Mengzi (Mencius) [c.332 BCE], 1.A.3) | |
| A reaction: A nice illustration, in my view, of the universality of truths about human virtue. In no culture would this laughter be appropriate. Nevertheless, there must be degrees of dishonour. Better to flee than join in with the likely winners. |
| 8240 | A true king shares his pleasure with the people [Mengzi (Mencius)] |
| Full Idea: If you shared your enjoyment of music or of hunting with the people, you would be a true King. | |
| From: Mengzi (Mencius) (The Mengzi (Mencius) [c.332 BCE], 1.B.1) | |
| A reaction: I suspect that this is a great truth for dictators and traditional monarchs. One pictures the successful ones attending public entertainments, and allowing the public to see their own. Tyrants keep entertainment private. Nero is a counterexample! |
| 8237 | Extend the treatment of the old and young in your family to the rest of society [Mengzi (Mencius)] |
| Full Idea: Treat the aged of your own family in a manner befitting their venerable age and extend this treatment to the aged of other families. Treat your own young in a manner befitting their tender age, and extend this to the young of other families. | |
| From: Mengzi (Mencius) (The Mengzi (Mencius) [c.332 BCE], 1.A.7) | |
| A reaction: This seems to me to articulate the ideal of communitarianism very nicely. Morality is not just about healthy adults in war and peace. It must include the children and the old. The values of the family are above the values of contracts and calculations. |
| 8241 | Only put someone to death if the whole population believes it is deserved [Mengzi (Mencius)] |
| Full Idea: When close attendants say a man deserves death, do not listen; when all the councillors say so, do not listen; when everyone says so, have the case investigated. If he is guilty, put him to death; he was put to death by the whole country. | |
| From: Mengzi (Mencius) (The Mengzi (Mencius) [c.332 BCE], 1.B.7) | |
| A reaction: The jury system is a gesture in this direction. Compare Idea 95. In Mencius's time, no doubt, everyone believed that capital punishment was sometimes right. Nowadays, when many people (e.g. me) reject it, the procedure won't work. |
| 8238 | Seeking peace through war is like looking for fish up a tree [Mengzi (Mencius)] |
| Full Idea: Your desire to extend your territory by war, in order to bring peace, is like looking for fish by climbing a tree. | |
| From: Mengzi (Mencius) (The Mengzi (Mencius) [c.332 BCE], 1.A.7) | |
| A reaction: Mencius had a flair for analogies. Just occasionally I suppose he might be wrong on this point, but I would think that experiments in the laboratory of history have shown that he is right in nearly all cases. |
| 8236 | Avoid the animals you are going to eat, as it is hard once you have got to know them [Mengzi (Mencius)] |
| Full Idea: Once a gentleman has seen animals alive, he cannot bear to see them die, and once having heard their cry, he cannot bear to eat their flesh. That is why the gentleman keeps his distance from the kitchen. | |
| From: Mengzi (Mencius) (The Mengzi (Mencius) [c.332 BCE], 1.A.7) | |
| A reaction: If you applied this to a Gestapo officer and his victims, it would obviously be the epitome of wickedness. But it is complex. Compassion is expected when we encounter suffering, but we are not obliged to seek out suffering. Or are we? |
| 15822 | The concept of physical necessity is basic to both causation, and to the concept of nature [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: It is generally agreed, I think, that the concept of physical necessity, or a law of nature, is fundamental to the theory of causation and, more generally, to the concept of nature. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 2.3) | |
| A reaction: This seems intuitively right, but we might be able to formulate a concept of nature that had a bit less necessity in it, especially if we read a few books on quantum theory first. |
| 15823 | Some propose a distinct 'agent causation', as well as 'event causation' [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: Sometimes a distinction is made between 'event causation' and 'agent causation' and it has been suggested that there is an unbridgeable gap between the two. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 2.5) | |
| A reaction: Nope, don't buy that. I connect it with Davidson's 'anomalous monism', that tries to combine one substance with separate laws of action. The metaphysical price for such a theory is too high to pay. |
| 15820 | A 'law of nature' is just something which is physically necessary [Chisholm] |
| Full Idea: When we say something is 'physically necessary' we can replace it with 'law of nature'. | |
| From: Roderick Chisholm (Person and Object [1976], 2.2) | |
| A reaction: [plucked out of context even more than usual!] This is illuminating about what contemporary philosophers (such as Armstrong) seem to mean by a law of nature. It is not some grand equation, but a small local necessary connection. |
| 7482 | Resurrection developed in Judaism as a response to martyrdoms, in about 160 BCE [Anon (Dan), by Watson] |
| Full Idea: The idea of resurrection in Judaism seems to have first developed around 160 BCE, during the time of religious martyrdom, and as a response to it (the martyrs were surely not dying forever?). It is first mentioned in the book of Daniel. | |
| From: report of Anon (Dan) (27: Book of Daniel [c.165 BCE], Ch.7) by Peter Watson - Ideas | |
| A reaction: Idea 7473 suggests that Zoroaster beat them to it by 800 years. |