5 ideas
| 3291 | Emergent properties appear at high levels of complexity, but aren't explainable by the lower levels [Nagel] |
| Full Idea: The supposition that a diamond or organism should truly have emergent properties is that they appear at certain complex levels of organisation, but are not explainable (even in principle) in terms of any more fundamental properties of the system. | |
| From: Thomas Nagel (Panpsychism [1979], p.186) |
| 21058 | Enlightenment requires the free use of reason in the public realm [Kant] |
| Full Idea: The public use of man's reason must always be free, and it alone can bring about enlightenment among men; the private use of reason may quite often be very narrowly restricted (…in a particular civil post or office). | |
| From: Immanuel Kant (Answer to 'What is Enlightenment?' [1784], p.55) | |
| A reaction: The private aspect seems to be the common restriction on speech by employees of the state. Does free speech have only instrumental value? Is the life of virtue possible without it? |
| 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 |
| 3290 | Given the nature of heat and of water, it is literally impossible for water not to boil at the right heat [Nagel] |
| Full Idea: Given what heat is and what water is, it is literally impossible for water to be heated beyond a certain point at normal atmospheric pressure without boiling. | |
| From: Thomas Nagel (Panpsychism [1979], p.186) |
| 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. |