4 ideas
2667 | A false object might give the same presentation as a true one [Arcesilaus, by Cicero] |
Full Idea: Arcesilaus said that no presentation proceeding from a true object is such that a presentation proceeding from a false one might not also be of the same form. This is the one argument that has held the field down to the present day. | |
From: report of Arcesilaus (fragments/reports [c.275 BCE]) by M. Tullius Cicero - Academica II.24.77 |
21932 | 'Différance' is the interwoven history of each sign [Derrida, by Glendinning] |
Full Idea: What Derrida calls 'différance' can be understood as the movement through which every sign is 'constituted historically as a weave of differences'....This replacement for 'speech' in the 'origin' of the system is to avoid the circularity in structuralism. | |
From: report of Jacques Derrida (Différance [1982]) by Simon Glendinning - Derrida: A Very Short Introduction 5 | |
A reaction: [compressed] Struggling to grasp this. Some English words entirely change their meaning over time (e.g. buxom). Does the lost meaning remain part of the new meaning? If so, how? He also calls différance 'sameness which is not identical'. |
1748 | Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless [Archelaus, by Diog. Laertius] |
Full Idea: Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless. | |
From: report of Archelaus (fragments/reports [c.450 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.Ar.3 |
5989 | Archelaus said life began in a primeval slime [Archelaus, by Schofield] |
Full Idea: Archelaus wrote that life on Earth began in a primeval slime. | |
From: report of Archelaus (fragments/reports [c.450 BCE]) by Malcolm Schofield - Archelaus | |
A reaction: This sounds like a fairly clearcut assertion of the production of life by evolution. Darwin's contribution was to propose the mechanism for achieving it. We should honour the name of Archelaus for this idea. |