Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Punctual and segmentive Hopi verbs' and 'The Search After Truth'

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5 ideas

8. Modes of Existence / B. Properties / 8. Properties as Modes
16669 Everything that exists is either a being, or some mode of a being [Malebranche]
     Full Idea: It is absolutely necessary that everything in the world be either a being or a mode [manière] of a being.
     From: Nicolas Malebranche (The Search After Truth [1675], III.2.8.ii), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 13.4
13. Knowledge Criteria / E. Relativism / 5. Language Relativism
3914 Language arranges sensory experience to form a world-order [Whorf]
     Full Idea: Language first of all is a classification and arrangement of the stream of sensory experience which results in a certain world-order.
     From: Benjamin Lee Whorf (Punctual and segmentive Hopi verbs [1936], p.55)
     A reaction: This is only true to a limited degree. See Davidson's 'On the very idea of a conceptual scheme'. All humans share a world-order, to some extent.
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 5. Infinite in Nature
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
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 9. General Causation / d. Causal necessity
12726 In a true cause we see a necessary connection [Malebranche]
     Full Idea: A true cause is one in which the mind perceives a necessary connection between the cause and its effect.
     From: Nicolas Malebranche (The Search After Truth [1675], 1.649 (450)), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 5
     A reaction: Presumably Hume was ignorant of 'true' causes, since he says he never saw this connection. But then is the perception done by the mind, or by the senses?
27. Natural Reality / G. Biology / 3. Evolution
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.