14 ideas
15533 | We can quantify over fictions by quantifying for real over their names [Lewis] |
Full Idea: Substitutionalists simulate quantification over fictional characters by quantifying for real over fictional names. | |
From: David Lewis (Noneism or Allism? [1990], p.159) | |
A reaction: I would say that a fiction is a file of conceptual information, identified by a label. The label brings baggage with it, and there is no existence in the label. |
15534 | We could quantify over impossible objects - as bundles of properties [Lewis] |
Full Idea: We can quantify over Meinongian objects by quantifying for real over property bundles (such as the bundle of roundness and squareness). | |
From: David Lewis (Noneism or Allism? [1990], p.159) |
15532 | 'Allists' embrace the existence of all controversial entities; 'noneists' reject all but the obvious ones [Lewis] |
Full Idea: An expansive friend of the controversial entities who says they all exist may be called an 'allist'; a tough desert-dweller who says that none of them exist may be called a 'noneist'. | |
From: David Lewis (Noneism or Allism? [1990], p.152) | |
A reaction: Lewis gives examples of the obvious and the controversial entities. Lewis implies that he himself is in between. The word 'desert' is a reference to Quine. |
15535 | We can't accept a use of 'existence' that says only some of the things there are actually exist [Lewis] |
Full Idea: If 'existence' is understood so that it can be a substantive thesis that only some of the things there are exist, we will have none of it. | |
From: David Lewis (Noneism or Allism? [1990], p.163) | |
A reaction: Lewis is a strong advocate, following Quine, of the univocal sense of the word 'exist', and I agree with them. |
21506 | A coherence theory of justification can combine with a correspondence theory of truth [Bonjour] |
Full Idea: There is no manifest absurdity in combining a coherence theory of justification with a correspondence theory of truth. | |
From: Laurence Bonjour (The Structure of Empirical Knowledge [1985], 5.1) | |
A reaction: His point is to sharply (and correctly) distinguish coherent justification from a coherence theory of truth. Personally I would recommend talking of a 'robust' theory of truth, without tricky commitment to 'correspondence' between very dissimilar things. |
21509 | There will always be a vast number of equally coherent but rival systems [Bonjour] |
Full Idea: On any plausible conception of coherence, there will always be many, probably infinitely many, different and incompatible systems of belief which are equally coherent. | |
From: Laurence Bonjour (The Structure of Empirical Knowledge [1985], 5.5) | |
A reaction: If 'infinitely many' theories are allowed, that blocks the coherentist hope that widening and precisifying the system will narrow down the options and offer some verisimilitude. If we stick to current English expression, that should keep them finite. |
21503 | Empirical coherence must attribute reliability to spontaneous experience [Bonjour] |
Full Idea: An empirical coherence theory needs, for the beliefs of a cognitive system to be even candidates for empirical justification, that the system must contain laws attributing a high degree of reliability to a variety of spontaneous cognitive beliefs. | |
From: Laurence Bonjour (The Structure of Empirical Knowledge [1985], 7.1) | |
A reaction: Wanting such a 'law' seems optimistic, and not in the spirit of true coherentism, which can individually evaluate each experiential belief. I'm not sure Bonjour's Observation Requirement is needed, since it is incoherent to neglect observations. |
21511 | A well written novel cannot possibly match a real belief system for coherence [Bonjour] |
Full Idea: It is not even minimally plausible that a well written novel ...would have the degree of coherence required to be a serious alternative to anyone's actual system of beliefs. | |
From: Laurence Bonjour (The Structure of Empirical Knowledge [1985], 5.5) | |
A reaction: This seems correct. 'Bleak House' is wonderfully consistent, but its elements are entirely verbal, and nothing occupies the space between the facts that are described. And Lady Dedlock is not in Debrett. I think this kills a standard objection. |
21510 | The objection that a negated system is equally coherent assume that coherence is consistency [Bonjour] |
Full Idea: Sometimes it is said that if one has an appropriately coherent system, an alternative system can be produced simply be negating all of the components of the first system. This would only be so if coherence amounted simply to consistency. | |
From: Laurence Bonjour (The Structure of Empirical Knowledge [1985], 5.5) | |
A reaction: I associate Russell with this original objection to coherentism. I formerly took this to be a serious problem, and am now relieved to see that it clearly isn't. |
21505 | A coherent system can be justified with initial beliefs lacking all credibility [Bonjour] |
Full Idea: It is simply not necessary in order for [the coherence] view to yield justification to suppose that cognitively spontaneous beliefs have some degree of initial or independent credibility. | |
From: Laurence Bonjour (The Structure of Empirical Knowledge [1985], 7.2) | |
A reaction: This is thoroughly and rather persuasively criticised by Erik Olson. But he always focuses on the coherence of a 'system' with multiple beliefs. I take the credibility of each individual belief to need coherent assessment against a full background. |
21504 | The best explanation of coherent observations is they are caused by and correspond to reality [Bonjour] |
Full Idea: The best explanation for a stable system of beliefs which rely on observation is that the beliefs are caused by what they depict, and the system roughly corresponds to the independent reality it describes. | |
From: Laurence Bonjour (The Structure of Empirical Knowledge [1985], 8.3) | |
A reaction: [compressed] Anyone who links best explanation to coherence (and to induction) warms the cockles of my heart. Erik Olson offers a critique, but doesn't convince me. The alternative is to find a better explanation (than reality), or give up. |
21508 | Anomalies challenge the claim that the basic explanations are actually basic [Bonjour] |
Full Idea: The distinctive significance of anomalies lies in the fact that they undermine the claim of the allegedly basic explanatory principles to be genuinely basic. | |
From: Laurence Bonjour (The Structure of Empirical Knowledge [1985], 5.3) | |
A reaction: This seems plausible, suggesting that (rather than an anomaly flatly 'falsifying' a theory) an anomaly may just demand a restructuring or reconceptualising of the theory. |
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. |